What A Day
by Kuroida
Summary: “So he either dies of the pain from his burns or dies of cold. Hmm, decisions decisions." Ed thought sarcastically. Roy and Ed, while on the way to Briggs, get attacked by homunculi. It's cold, both are injured and all Ed can think of is "why him?"
1. Chapter 1: Eventful

Ed woke up suddenly to a blistering cold. Where was he? Shivering slightly he burrowed his head underneath the two blankets that were already draped around him and closed his eyes, trying to concentrate and remember what had happened earlier.

The Promised Day had come and gone; they had been successful in stopping Father's plans but could not prevent the homunculi from reviving. Now, he and Colonel Mustang were being sent out to Briggs HQ to help them prepare for the upcoming war between Amestris and the homunculi. Ed remembered complaining about having to be separated with Al, who had just gotten his body back thanks to The Promised Day, but had grudgingly went along, knowing that Al would be needed to help Central prepare for the war as well. He just wished he'd had more time to celebrate the re-gaining of his brother's body and he also wished that he didn't have to take the mission with an ass like Mustang.

"_Now's not the time to be complaining, just think about why they hell I'm lying here" _

Then he remembered, along the way to Briggs he had been attacked by Lust. He remembered the cold and exhaustion he had put up with and a hazy mental image of Lust standing over his body, her nails dripping with his blood, formed in his mind.

"_Then what?" _

Ed thought hard but came up with nothing. He'd probably passed out after that. Sighing, he opened his eyes and looked around more carefully. Where was he now? Surely not dead but not on the battlefield either. He couldn't see much. Dim light was coming from somewhere but he wasn't really sure where and he hesitated before pulling the blankets off of him and sitting up.

He realized he wasn't wearing a shirt and decided to huddle in his coat that had been draped over him. Inspecting himself for any wounds he noticed that his ring and middle fingers were splintered. There was also a gash along his abdomen that had been burned closed; it had then been bandaged with what felt like a shirt. It was most defiantly Mustang's work.

"_Great, he'd better not have used my shirt" _Ed said to himself, blindly feeling around for it. Luckily, his fingers almost instantly wrapped around it and he lifted it up towards the dim light penetrating through whatever structure he was in. He noticed a few blood stains but he would be able get rid of them easily with alchemy.

Deciding to worry about stains later, Ed quickly put it on and draped his coat over his shoulders before looking around once more. By now, his eyes had accustomed to the dim light and he soon realized he was in an igloo. Or at least something that resembled an igloo.

"_Should I even bother asking Mustang how he knows the alchemic array to build an igloo?" _Ed thought to himself. Speaking of which, where was that bastard? He defiantly wasn't in the igloo and Ed sighed before pulling out his gloves in his pants pocket and crawling out of the confines of the blankets towards the light emitting from outside.

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Outside, he noticed a small fire was burning which explained the light. Mustang was easy to find, he was in full military attire and huddled in a tight ball next to the fire, his back facing the igloo and Ed.

"_How is the idiot not dead of hypothermia yet?"_ Ed wondered, walking over to Mustang.

"Colonel?" Ed asked hesitantly, kneeling behind Mustang and shaking him gently. When Mustang didn't even flinch Ed shook harder "Colonel!" Still nothing.

"Oi, wake up!" Ed yelled, standing up and kicking Mustang in the back.

Mustang's eyes shot open, jerking awake. His back arching away from Ed and he made a sound that sounded like a mix of a hiss and a yelp. His face instantly tightened into a look of pain and he closed his eyes tightly for a few moments before opening them again, turning ever so slightly to glare at Ed.

"What the hell do you want Fullmetal?"Roy hissed at the boy.

Ed, who hadn't been expecting such a sudden and pained reaction, had fallen back in the snow in surprise, feeling guilty for what he'd done. This guilt led to unwelcome worry and anger as he was soon up on his knees glooming over Mustang who was still lying on his side.

"What are you? Crazy? You're going to freeze to death. Where's your coat god damn it" Ed asked angrily.

Mustang blinked a few times.

"You're wearing it idiot"

Now it was Ed's turned to blink as he looked at himself for the first time since he'd gone outside. What he had thought was his own coat draped over him was instead the Colonel's coat, much to Ed's annoyance."

"_Damn him for always looking after his subordinates better than himself." _He felt like an idiot now and couldn't stop the guilty feeling from re-surfacing again either.

Looking away from the coat, Ed realized that Mustang was still looking up at him and he had his trademark smirk on his face. Ed was very close to hitting him again but eventually decided against it.

"Fine, then where's my coat?" Ed huffed, crossing his arms and choosing to not look at Mustang for the time being.

"Somewhere in there, it got torn to shreds and I'm sure you can fix it better than I can"

"And yet you can make an igloo?"

Mustang chose to ignore that remark, instead asking "Are you OK?"

"Yeah, yeah, I'm fine, just got a few broken fingers that's all" waving said fingers in the air. "Thanks for splintering them, what'd you use? Wood?"

Mustang gave a grunt for confirmation and closed his eyes.

"Are you OK?" Ed asked after a while, knowing what Mustang would say but deciding to ask anyways.

"I'm fine" Mustang said, right on Ed's cue.

Ed couldn't help but roll his eyes a bit and noticed that the Colonel was shivering visibly now that he was awake.

"Sure you are" Ed said sarcastically "Why didn't you come into the igloo?"

"Because if _I_ woke up next to _my _superior officer I'd freak out too....unless she was a beautiful woman of course"

Ed opened his mouth to make a snappy retort but closed it when he realized the Colonel was right, he _would_ have freaked out if he just woke up with his superior sleeping next to him. It took a while longer to finally clue in on the 2nd part of the Colonel's statement.

"Pervert" Ed growled, flicking Mustang lightly on the shoulder when Mustang's face gave way to another smirk.

"Now come on, you're like ice, get inside"

"No"

"What? Why not?"

"Don't feel like it"

"What do you mean don't feel like it?!" Ed was starting to get really pissed off at the Colonel's stubborn attitude.

"You're just going to lie here and freeze to death because you're too lazy to get off your ass and come inside?"

"Not lazy" Mustang opening his eyes again to look up at Ed who was still towering over him.

"Oh yeah, sorry, you just think you're so superior that you're above sleeping in the same vicinity as one of your lowly subordinates" Ed answered, sitting down stubbornly and looking at anything other than Mustang.

Time passed in silence with Mustang too tired and cold to make conversation and Ed fuming away in anger.

Ed knew what he had just said wasn't true; Mustang would probably kill and get killed for him. It was the fact that he was actually worrying over the stupid bastard that made Ed feel frustrated. Either way, he couldn't help it at the moment; he felt that something was wrong but couldn't pin point what it was exactly. Mustang looked like he had been in pain but he didn't see any injuries on him...then again, he was lying on his side fully clothed so all he really could see was the left side of his face. Mustang was even wearing his gloves with him although it was probably because he was cold.

"_Either way it's not like him to get those wet"_

Cold was another factor, Mustang's lips were already starting to turn blue and he was shivering a lot, teeth chattering away hard enough to break his jaw. Not only that but Ed figured a good half of his body was wet from the snow and if Mustang didn't have hypothermia already then he could easily catch it with him half soaked. The fire only did so much to warm Mustang and Ed didn't even know how long he'd been lying out here in the first place.

"_Wonder what time it is" _Ed thought to himself, pulling his watch out of his pocket and checking it.

"_2 in the morning. Great, just fucking great. He's been here for over 5 hours" _Ed noted, remembering that when he was battling Lust, the sun was still up signalling that it was around late afternoon. On the positive side, that meant that the temperature would start increasing soon when dawn broke, although here in Briggs it didn't really increase that much to begin with.

"_I've got to get him inside and warmed up soon or we'll both freeze to death out here" _

Ed didn't even know if Mustang didn't _want _to come inside or simply_ couldn't._

"_Guess I'll just have to find out....although he's not going to tell me directly"_

Sighing, Ed tightened Mustang's coat around him and started speaking.

"So...."

"_Oh damn this is awkward"_

"....what happened? Where's Lust?"

Ed waited for an answer of some kind and when he got none he started to worry. He got back up on his knees so he was looking down at Mustang again and was somewhat scared to find that the Colonel's eyes were closed. Not only that but his face had turned extremely pale and he had stopped shivering. Ed also noted that Mustang's breaths were coming out as short erratic gasps as if he wasn't getting enough oxygen.

"_Shit, not good, not good"_

"Hey, you idiot, don't go to sleep!" Ed yelled, shaking Mustang slightly.

"Wake up Colonel" Ed shook a little bit harder and didn't even get a groan as a reaction.

"Mustang!" Ed yelled, sitting down and kicking the Colonel in the back again.

Granted it wasn't the best way to wake the man up judging by his reaction last time but at least that had yielded results and almost instantly Mustang's eyes shot open again. He gave a strangled cry and rolled over so fast Ed didn't have time to get out of the way. It ended up with Ed's legs pinned under Mustang which caused him to cry out again and arch his back upwards painfully.

"I'm sorry! I'm sorry!" Ed yelled, wrenching his feet free and getting onto his knees again, holding on to Mustang's head as he closed his eyes tightly and just focused on breathing.

"I just needed you to wake up, you weren't responding to anything else I did and if you fall asleep now you're not going to be able to wake up again"

Mustang probably wasn't even listening to Ed right now. He was still concentrating on just breathing, but after a while Ed grew silent and Roy opened his eyes tiredly, blinking a few times to concentrate on Ed out of all the other fuzzy images spinning in his head.

Ed was staring at him in a mix of shock and horror which confused Mustang greatly.

"Fullmetal? What's wrong?" he managed to rasp out

Mustang cursed himself for how pathetic his voice sounded but Ed didn't look like he cared, the damn shrimp was still staring at him like he was some monster.

"_God damn it, when he was half dead I didn't look at him like that"_

After a few more seconds of silence Mustang was starting to feel uncomfortable.

"uhh....Ed?"

The use of his name somehow seemed to motivate Ed enough to blink and point to Mustang's face.

"Colonel, what the hell did you do to yourself?"

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"_Oh shit what was that idiot thinking?!"_

"....it was a misfire, happens all the time" Mustang said, looking away from Ed.

"_Like hell it was"_

Mustang had been lying on his side which explained why Ed hadn't been able to clearly see the total mess he'd done to the right side of his face. It looked like it had been burnt pretty badly, just border line between a 2nd degree and a 3rd degree. There was a palm sized burn around Mustang's eye, stretching from his cheek bone to past his eyebrow. The skin around the eye had started to blister and swell, pushing the eyelid closed. The skin on the forehead was peeling back and in various places it had turned black.

However, the main thing that caused Ed to look in shock was a thin red-black burn, which ran from the larger burn down to the middle of Mustang's cheek. There, it made a 90 degree turn outwards and continued all the way down; through the neck only to disappear beneath the folds of Mustang's uniform.

If it was anyone other than Ed, they would have most likely paid more attention to the larger burn than the smaller one and believed the Colonel's statement that it had been an accident. Ed knew better. The burn looked like it had been drawn with a pencil and it was much too thin and precise to have been done accidentally. Someone made sure that the burn went straight down, turned at almost exactly 90 degrees and continued down and who could have done it better than the Flame Alchemist himself?

This realization caused chills to run down Ed's spine, his mind flashed quickly back to the Colonel's pained reaction when Ed had kicked him and he also noted that the burn running down his face and neck looked like it continued onwards.

"Show me"

Mustang turned and looked at Ed, his face unreadable

"....it's nothing...really, you don't have to see"

Ed threw the Colonel a "don't fuck with me" glare and began un-doing one of the many buttons lining Roy's uniform.

Given any other situation the Colonel would have made a comment about the awkwardness of this situation, just to piss Ed off. Now however did not seem to be a good time so Mustang tried to squirm away from Ed but whenever he moved, Ed would grab onto his uniform and head and hold him down. Mustang then noticed for the first time that he actually had his head in Fullmetal's lap.

"_Well, that's just great" _Mustang thought sarcastically. By now even the slightest movement caused freezing agony to run through his body and eventually he stopped struggling and welcomed the slight body heat that Ed gave off.

"_Why the hell do these things have so many buttons?" _Ed's splintered fingers were driving him crazy. It made unbuttoning uniforms feel a lot harder than it really was and Ed wasn't even left handed in the first place. His right, automail arm was holding on to Mustang's head and Ed didn't really feel like letting it go, otherwise he'd have the Colonel's head directly in his lap.....and Ed figured that'd be just plain awkward.

"Stop" Mustang seemed to have noticed Ed's difficulties but Ed ignored him, not wanting to give the chance for Mustang to try and squirm away again. He was almost done anyways and he just _had _to see what on earth Mustang had done to his body.

"I said stop"

Ed paused to look at the Colonel who had grabbed Ed's wrist.

"I'll do it, just quit ruining your fingers, I spent a long time splintering those" Mustang sighed, pushing Ed's hands away and unbuttoning the rest of the buttons with much more ease than Ed.

Then came the hard part, with much difficulty Mustang sat up, ignoring the pain and biting down his lip to silence any noise that he might make. Ed helped prop him up as Mustang removed the soaking wet uniform entirely, tossing it aside before collapsing back into Ed's lap, exhausted.

"_Damn I feel like shit. This is so embarrassing" _

Mustang had closed his eyes again; his breathing came out as uneven hisses between his lips, much too fast and small to be healthy. Ed found himself not caring at the moment that Mustang might be falling asleep again. Instead, his eyes were focused entirely on Mustang's body.

"_Oh man, I think I'm going to puke"_

The sight before Ed was disturbing to say the least. Mustang's whole body was burned horribly, even worse than his face. Black and charred flesh littered the areas surrounding his torso, back and arms while in other places, the skin was blood red. Blisters had formed along the arms and Ed yanked off Mustang's gloves to follow the lines.

Ed had prepared himself for the sight of the burns but he was not prepared for the form the burns had taken shape.

"It's an....alchemy circle?" Ed whispered, wanting to trace the huge pattern on Mustang's chest.

And indeed it was, it looked like Mustang had burned several different alchemy circles into his flesh and connected them all together. There was an extremely large one in the middle of his chest and two medium sized ones were on his back, one by his shoulder blade and another further down. 2 more circles were on the back of both of Mustang's hands and everything was connected together with lines, ranging from thick and thin, that seemed to run all over Mustang's body.

At least the burns weren't life threatening, although they probably hurt like hell. It looked like a major 2nd degree burn and hopefully, no muscle, ligament tissue or anything else underneath was damaged.

The alchemist side of Ed was fascinated, he'd only ever seen an alchemic array so complex before in textbooks. Not only that, but this was burned into Mustang's flesh and Ed hadn't even known that was possible.

"_Does it still work like a regular array?" _

Ed wondered how powerful it was for Mustang to be willing to burn his own body for it. He reached over to run his finger along the circle on Mustang's chest with the desire to test out the array.

However, the 16 year old boy side of Ed was slapping him for even considering trying it out.

"_You idiot! You don't have enough energy to use any alchemy at the moment and you want to go activating one that's literally on the Colonel? You don't even know how it works, you could die....__**he **__could die."_

In the end the boy side won over and Ed quickly removed his hand, feeling ashamed he'd even thought of the idea.

The array probably went down to Mustang's legs but Ed felt like he'd seen enough at the time being. He was still wrapping his head around the fact that Mustang had done this on _himself._

He maneuvered his mind back to the task on hand. The Colonel was probably freezing now that he was lying bare back in the snow and his eyes were closed again. Panicking slightly Ed reached over and slapped Mustang's cheek lightly.

"Oi, what'd I say about going to sleep?"

Mustang's brow knit together and he emitted a low groan of pain as he forced his eyes open. A few seconds later they dropped slightly, eyes turning unfocused.

"If you want to sleep come inside so at least you'll be warmer"

"....no"

Ed growled, was the Colonel still trying to prove he was strong enough to survive out here in the cold?

"You're an idiot you know that, just suck in that god complex of yours for once and get inside OK?"

"....it makes me feel better..."

"What?"

"The cold...it makes the pain go away"

Mustang closed his eyes, slightly embarrassed that he'd actually said that out loud. He hated sounding weak.

Ed remained silent, thinking.

"_Great, now what? I can't move him, he doesn't want to move himself and we both don't have the energy to use any alchemy."_

And now that Mustang had pretty much admitted that he was in pain, Ed was hesitant to force the Colonel to get up, especially when the cold was helping him more than Ed would have been able to.

"_So he either dies of the pain from his burns or dies of cold. Hmm, decisions decisions" _Ed thought sarcastically.

While Ed tried to sort out the dilemma, he wrapped his arms around the Colonel's head and leaned in more to try and share body heat.

Mustang wasn't exactly fond of that idea and tried to squirm away from Ed only to find him being held on tighter.

"Can you not be an ass for one night?" Ed growled

Mustang opened his eyes half way to look at Ed before sighing and giving up his squirming. He had decided that he was just too tired and cold to even consider his dignity anymore.

"You've got way too much pride you know that?"

"You just don't have enough" Mustang muttered, closing his eyes again.

Ed watched as the Colonel's chest fluttered up and down with each quick and shallow breath he took. The Colonel's eyebrows were knitted together in pain and Ed reached over to the side of the Colonel's neck to check his pulse.

"_Dammit, too weak and too fast. He's already in Stage 2."_

Ed knew that if the Colonel reached Stage 3 of hypothermia then moving would be near impossible for him due to the loss of muscle coordination. He couldn't let that happen, otherwise the Colonel was as good as dead.

Ed then reached over to his own neck and checked his own pulse. It wasn't as weak as the Colonel's but Ed knew that he was very close to catching hypothermia himself. Ed was shivering mildly and his breathing was starting to become quick and shallow.

"_If we keep this up we'll both die"_

But there was no way he was leaving the Colonel out here alone.

Thus proceeded a few minutes of silence with Ed still trying to solve their current dilemma and Mustang half asleep in the snow.

"_Maybe I should put his uniform back on him" _

Ed soon dismissed that idea. The uniform was mostly made out of cotton which retained water so it would probably do more harm than good in this current state. Besides, it was probably freezing cold and soaked already, having been lying there in the snow for quite some time.

"You OK?"

Ed nearly jumped as the Colonel spoke up; he had thought he had been asleep all this time.

"...Yeah....course I am" Ed lied. He was freezing to the bone and his fingers were starting to turn blue but he didn't want the Colonel worrying about him.

"No you're not, your shaking more than I am"

Mustang forced his eyes opened and looked up at Ed.

"And your lips are blue"

"Well so are yours" Ed replied rather defensively.

"Get inside"

"I'm staying right here"

"That's an order"

"And why should I listen to you? It's not like _you're_ going anywhere"

Mustang remained silent at the reply and Ed felt triumphant that he'd won the little argument that had sprung up.

"_The bastard's got no right telling me how to take care of myself if he can't do it to himself in the first place"_

At least, that was what Ed thought until Mustang suddenly jerked forward and sat up. There was a flicker of pain shown in his eyes and face but Mustang wiped it off almost immediately.

"What the fuck do you think you're doing?!"

"I'm 'going somewhere'....and you're coming"

"What?!"

"Just help me up....can't have you dying because of me..." Mustang said the second part of the sentence much quieter than the first part and Ed barely heard it. He felt kind of touched that the Colonel was getting up mainly because of him but he was quick to brush off the sappy feeling.

"_He's an idiot, he might be a really good guy underneath.... and he looks after his subordinates really well to be honest...but he's still an idiot"_

Nevertheless, Ed quickly got up and grabbed the Colonel's hands -careful to avoid the burns on the back of them- and pulled hard.

With a grunt of pain and a quick closing of his eyes Mustang slowly got up onto his feet only to nearly topple over after a few seconds. Thankfully, Ed caught him and help right him and soon, Mustang quickly made his way to the igloo entrance before dropping like a rock onto his knees.

To Mustang, his body felt like it was on fire and the few steps it had taken to get to the igloo entrance made him feel like he had just ran a marathon. He was shivering hard and his body had started to give off a cold sweat. His eyes made everything look fuzzy and the pain from his burns was unbearable. He wanted to scream and just curl up in a little ball and go to sleep where he sat.

"_Almost there, I can do this, come on damn it move"_

Mustang gave a grunt and forced his body to crawl quickly through the igloo entrance. The sooner he got this over and done with the better. He didn't think he could ignore the pain for much longer without the need to vomit.

Ed followed soon after, marvelling at the effects of sheer willpower and the amount the Colonel had.

There was no snow under the igloo since it had all been used to make the igloo in the first place. Therefore, when Ed crawled through the entrance the first thing he found was the Colonel lying up with his back pushed up against the snow wall. Obviously, the cold made his burns feel better and even though he had managed to keep his face impassive, the Colonel's eyes reflected all the pain he was holding in.

Still, Ed didn't think it was a good idea to let the Colonel just lie there. He was awake, although his eyes had clouded over as if he wasn't really all there. This scared Ed and he crawled over to Mustang and shook him gently.

"Come on, turn around, we've got to get you dry and warmed up."

Mustang blinked at the physical contact, his eyes coming into focus. However, at Ed's comment he just groaned and closed his eyes.

Ed paused.

"...Please?"

Mustang remained silent for a while but eventually sighed and rolled over away from the comfort of the wall.

"Who are you and what have you done with Fullmetal?" Mustang managed to grind out through chattering teeth.

Ed was too embarrassed to reply, instead he just flicked the Colonel lightly again on the shoulder and Mustang gave a small smirk, eyes still closed.

After Ed got over his initial embarrassment, he allowed himself a small smile too before grabbing a blanket and crawling over to Mustang's head. Lifting it slightly, he then proceeded to dry off the snow from the Colonel's hair.

"You better not start squirming. It's either this or die got it?"

"_God damn it. If he ever mentions this again I'll kill him myself"_

Ed's words must have done the trick since Mustang actually stayed in once place during the drying process. When his hair was dry enough Ed did a quick rub down of the Colonel's back and threw the second drier blanket unceremoniously on top of him.

"Here bastard. Don't die."

"Mmm" was all Mustang said, his hands adjusting the blanket and his body automatically curling up into a little ball. The blanket was big and thick enough to soak in any small traces of excess water on the Colonel's body without losing its ability to keep its occupant warm.

As Ed lay down and began to make himself comfortable (_he_ needed to sleep too) he took one last look at the Colonel, hoping to pick up something that seemed out of place if there was anything.

Mustang's condition was pretty much the same as before and Ed told himself that it would get better over time so he dismissed them for now; there wasn't much he could do for him now anyways. Instead he noticed that the Colonel was very tense, his body wasn't moving as much as it should have been from shivering and he was grinding his teeth together, preventing them from chattering.

"_The burns"_

Ed yanked off the glove covering his automail hand with his teeth. Reaching under the Colonel's blanket he placed his palm on Mustang's back. As the cool metal reached skin Ed felt the Colonel give a small shudder upon contact before relaxing under Ed's touch, most of the tension evaporating.

"_That should do for tonight I guess"_

The Ed realized something.

"Hey, you never told me what happened to Lust"

"I took care of her...again" Mustang mumbled, half asleep.

Ed didn't bother asking how.

Instead, he nodded and closed his eyes, intent on getting some sleep before dawn. However, he opened them again briefly when Mustang spoke up.

"...Thank you"

Ed chose not to reply for a moment before smiling.

"No problem... but you're still and idiot....and a bastard"

"And you're still a shrimp, what else is new?"

Ed got up to growl at his commanding officer but gave a small smile afterwards when Mustang made an amused noise and his face broke out into another grin.

"_Oh what a day" _Ed thought before drifting off into the bliss of sleep.

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First fan fic. I've got ideas for more chapters but I don't know if this is good enough fo me to continue or just sell it off as a one shot. Reviews would be greatly appreciated! ^_^


	2. Chapter 2: Interesting

Well, the reviews I've gotten (after only one day too!) were all around positive so I've decided to continue.

To Unleash The Shadow's review: "I felt that this was mostly centered on keeping each other alive."

You have hit the nail square on the head.

This story was meant to be centered around Roy and Ed's relationship. However, I am intending for it to follow some sort of story since, I dunno, my mind works like that ^_^; Anyways, I've thought up of an idea on what the array _is_ but my reason as to _why_ Roy did it to himself is not going to be earth shattering.....if you're getting a bit skeptical of me then I can understand that. Just hear me out until this stories over and maybe it'll be better than you (or I) expected. ^_^; Like I said, I've got the whole idea planned out in my head, just have to go through task of writing it down.

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Ed woke up and almost freaked out when he found a rat lying next to him. However, upon more careful inspection he realized that what he thought was a glob of fur on top of a blanket was actually a mess of black hair.

_"Colonel"_

Ed still had his hand touching the Colonel's back through the blankets and was relieved to feel it moving up and down slightly with each breath the Colonel took. Apparently Mustang's breathing had evened out over the course of the night. He also wasn't shaking much anymore which was good.

Ed decided to do a better check up on the Colonel's condition later and slowly removed his hand from Mustang's back, ready to put it back down again if Mustang gave any sign of discomfort.

Upon the lack of the cold hand, the mess of black hair shifted slightly before settling down again.

Satisfied, Ed then proceeded to put his glove back on and look around the igloo once again. Wincing slightly in pain as the cut on his chest reminded himself that it was still there.

The sun was shining now and filtered sunlight streamed through the igloo, making it feel like the walls were glowing.

Ed noted that he was still wearing the Colonel's coat and promptly began looking around for his own. Mustang would need a coat and besides, his was way too big for Ed.

After a few seconds Ed caught a sliver of red fabric by the igloo wall near where Mustang lay and crawled over to grab it.

The Colonel had been right when he said that the jacket had been torn to shreds and Ed frowned distastefully when he saw the many holes and tears that lined it. Ed reasoned that he had enough energy to perform alchemy now and without a moment's hesitation Ed clapped his hands together, transmuting his jacket back into the red splendour that it had once been.

Holding the jacket up, Ed nodded in acceptance and approval of his work before almost jumping out of his skin when Mustang groaned behind him.

"ugh....Fullmetal?"

".....Yeah?"

_"shit, the light from the alchemy must have woken him up" _

The Colonel had his eyes peeping out of the blankets now and Ed saw traces of pain and exhaustion flickering in them now and then.

"Sorry I woke you" Ed said sheepishly. Mustang closed his eyes and burrowed his face back into the blanket leaving Ed talking to his hair again.

"Don't be, what time is it?" came the muffled reply.

Ed checked his pocket watch quickly.

"About 1 in the afternoon"

"How long does it take us to get to the next town?"

"About 5 hours....maybe more..."

"ugh....wake me up in an hour?"

"Sure" Ed answered immediately, knowing that less than 9 hours of sleep would not be enough to have Mustang fully functioning anyways. An extra hour didn't make that much of a difference in Ed's opinion but he was more than willing to let the Colonel sleep for the rest of the day if need be. Mustang might be a bastard but he deserved some sleep at least.

Ed quickly put his coat on and draped his blanket as well as Mustang's coat over the once again sleeping Colonel before crawling out of the igloo intent on finding some food.

Outside, the first thing Ed noticed was the Colonel's uniform jacket crumpled and frozen in the snow. He quickly transmuted it dry and hung it up on a nearby tree branch.

Ed then realized that the fire that had been burning away last night had reduced to a small gentle flicker. There was no way he could cook anything over such a small flame so he, slightly annoyed, he went to search for some fire wood.

_"Dammit, I hate chores. All I want is some food."_ Ed grumbled to himself.

Ed was honestly thinking of just eating the food cold but decided against it, reminding himself that the first day he had tried the Colonel had laughed his ass off at him when he ran into one of the bushes to puke it all out. Cold canned food just did _not_ taste good.

It took a good half an hour to find decent wood and after transmuting them dry Ed got stuck with the very annoying task of lighting the actual fire.

After finding wood, Mustang normally just snapped his fingers and presto, a fire was burning away. Now however was different and half way through, after many failed attempts and strings of curses, Ed was half inclined to just run into the igloo, yank off the Colonel's gloves and do it himself. Of course Ed couldn't do that and was now stuck furiously rubbing sticks together.

_"We should have brought matches"_

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Roy awoke again to Ed's swearing about god knows what.

_"Probably tripped or something" _Roy thought to himself. Fullmetal was prone to having a fit about just about anything.

Still huddled in his blankets Roy took out his pocket watch and checked the time.

_"It's almost 2, better get up"_

Roy knew that if he went back to sleep he'd have more difficulty getting up later. Plus the later he slept the later they'd get to the next town and therefore, the later they'd arrive at Briggs. They were actually supposed to have arrived in town last night. They whole trip had been planned following a town stop every day which explained the absence of them packing any tents in the first place. If Lust hadn't just suddenly popped up Roy realized he and Fullmetal would have been in a nice bed by now.

At least he had been smart enough to read up on alchemy useful for survival in the snow before the trip. Much to Roy's annoyance, Fullmetal was rather danger prone....and accident prone so he figured it would be in their best interest to at least learn how to spend a few nights out in the snow.

_"Still, wasn't really expecting **this**"_

Realizing that he'd been lying in the blankets far too long already Roy forced his eyes opened again and got up, hissing in pain as his body protested against such movement. He still felt like shit and he reasoned that the faster he got outside into the cool air, the better his burns would feel.

Quickly slipping on and zipping up his coat that he realized had been lying on top of him, he proceeded to crawl out into the open only to pause briefly when Fullmetal's enraged voice pierced the silence.

_"Is he talking to someone?"_

Curiosity getting the better of him, Roy quickly crawled outside only to smirk in amusement at the sight before him. And Fullmetal called _him_ an idiot.

_"Damn, I wish I had a camera.... but I guess I should help him out a little at least."_

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_­_­­­­­­­­_"I swear if this doesn't work I'll....I'll....damn I'll do **something**.... just haven't figured that out yet..." _

However, Ed's ranting to himself was cut short when he heard a loud snap and the pile of wood he had been leaning over suddenly burst into flame.

Ed jumped nearly a foot in the air in surprise, giving a startled yelp and landing painfully on his ass.

He instantly stood up and glared up at the man smirking down at him, amusement in his eyes.

"Give a kid a little warning when you do that!"

Much to Ed's annoyance, the Colonel's smirk only widened.

"You realize when you start fires you don't actually rub two sticks together and hope for a miracle right?"

Ed growled before he huffed and looked away, slightly embarrassed that he'd been doing it wrong the whole time.

"I was hungry" Ed stated simply, as if that explained everything.

"You could have just asked"

"....Didn't want to wake you up"

_"Well I guess that was nice of him" _Mustang thought to himself, deciding not to point out that Ed cursing was what had woken him up in the first place.

Stifling a yawn he sat down with a relieved sigh, standing had surprisingly taken a lot out him but at least the cold air had stopped the burns from acting up. All Mustang felt now was a heavy tingling sensation which irritated him to no end but he could ignore it as long as his skin didn't come into contact with anything hard.

_XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX_

Soon after they got the fire going, Ed and Mustang were sitting around it, munching happily on heated canned ravioli and vegetables.

Actually, it was Ed who was eating happily, Mustang just sat there and stared into the fire, trying very hard not to fall asleep where he sat.

"Aren't you going to eat?"

Mustang looked at his ravioli and his stomach churned. He didn't think his stomach could handle anything at the moment and, making a face, he wordlessly passed it to Ed.

Ed just looked at him.

"You should eat."

"I'll probably end up just puking it all out. Besides, you're still hungry aren't you?" Mustang replied, arm and can still raised towards Ed.

After a few minutes of staring,

_"Geez, why's he always staring when he's uncertain? Makes everything seem awkward"_

Ed reluctantly took the can and the ravioli was gone in mere minutes.

"We should get going" Mustang said, extinguishing the fire with a snap of his fingers. "The faster we start moving the faster we get a nice room with a bed."

Ed wanted to say something along the lines of "Are you alright?" but the comment died on his lips. Mustang wouldn't want to hear it and he wasn't about to admit that he was actually worried about the stupid bastard.

"You stay here, I'll get the bags. Oh and I hung up your uniform over there" Ed said, pointing.

Mustang gave a tired nod in thanks and Ed made his way over to the igloo.

Slowly, Mustang stood up and almost toppled over as the ground decided now would be a good time to move around instead of remaining flat like it was supposed to.

He had to blink a few times to clear the tiredness from his eyes. Soon however, righting his body, he made his way over to his uniform, putting it on before reapplying his coat, zipping it all the up past his nose.

Ed came out a few minutes later. Mustang remained standing otherwise he feared he'd fall asleep. It wasn't that standing prevented Mustang from falling asleep, it's just that the idea of taking a nose dive into the ground was rather unappealing to him and as long as he kept that in mind he would stay awake.

Either way, by the time Ed came out from the igloo with their bags, Mustang's sight was already getting fuzzy from exhaustion. Irritated, he rubbed them for a bit before walking over to Ed.

"Ready?" Mustang asked as they both put on their packs.

_"Dammit, has this thing always been so heavy?"_

"Yeah, let's go" Ed replied, having already started walking.

The trip to town was rather uneventful. Like every other day, Ed ran up ahead, humming a random song softly to himself while marvelling at the rather peaceful, snow filled scenery before him. His chest wound gave a slight sting whenever he made a sudden or exaggerated movement which wasn't often and the wound was quickly forgotten.

Mustang, like always, lagged behind, however, today he was lagging more than usual. Instead of enjoying the scenery around him he was staring at his feet, silently forcing them to keep moving. He was exhausted; the only thing that kept him from falling to his knees and going to sleep was the almost luxurious thought of a nice, soft, warm bed that awaited him in the next town.

The back pack was also driving Roy crazy, it was heavy and pressed painfully against his burns causing a rather annoying itching sensation. He had compromised by switching the bag on one shoulder but his burns still itched and he had to keep switching shoulders so they wouldn't go numb from the weight.

"Give me that"

Roy looked up at Ed who had spoken. Ed was standing only a few paces away from him, rolling his eyes and sticking out a hand for what Roy only presumed was for the back pack. Ed's whole body just radiated annoyance at Mustang's inability to carry his own pack and this lead to anger on Mustang's part. He hated feeling weak.

"I don't need your help Fullmetal"

Ed snorted and rolled his eyes again.

"Sure you don't"

Ed grabbed the pack off Mustang's shoulders almost instantly after he spoke and before Mustang could react Ed was already running up ahead, pack in tow.

Mustang growled and glared daggers at Ed's retreating back. After a while however he decided not to incinerate the shrimp where he stood because not having to lug around the pack actually felt pretty good....not that he'd ever admit that out loud though.

The rest of the trip passed by in relative silence aside from the occasional directional questions. Taking a break was out of the question, Mustang knew he'd fall asleep if he didn't keep moving. Besides, the less breaks, the faster they'd get to town.

Ed was probably thinking the same thing. If not then at least he kept his comments to himself. Previous days, Mustang always called the shots so maybe Ed was still respecting that authority, not that it really mattered much today.

Still, even at their constant pace, Roy and Ed didn't make it town until around midnight.

Finding a hotel was easy enough and soon the two were in a simple looking hotel room with two made beds just calling out to be slept in. However, both had other plans.

Roy almost immediately staggered into the bathroom first, much to Ed's surprise.

_"Guess the burns are acting up" _Ed told himself as he unpacked the few belongings he had.

"I'm going out! Better not drown in there or Hawkeye will have my ass got it?" Ed yelled through the sound of splashing water.

Ed got a muffled sound of words being spoken but he couldn't make them out past the door and the added sound of the shower. He presumed that at least the Colonel had heard him so without further delay he left the room and headed for the lobby, intent on asking directions to a 24 hour clinic.

_"Maybe I should check out the library too"_

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Unfortunately, the library was closed so late into the night so Ed had decided to come back tomorrow. Even though it technically was "tomorrow" since his pocket watch was telling him it was past 1 in the morning.

Sighing, he made his way back to the hotel, a bag of burn cream and bandages under his arm. The clinic had re-splintered his fingers and treated his chest wound. Doctors had said that the wound was pretty shallow but covered a large surface area. Either way, they estimated that the wound would completely heal over within the next few days, a week max.

Upon returning to the hotel room the first thing he noticed after turning on the lights was the Colonel lying on the bed farthest away from the window. Actually, the first thing he noticed was the Colonel's hair since the rest of him was underneath the thick blankets. The second thing he noticed was that the hair was moving.

_"What the fuck?"_

Curiosity getting the better of him Ed pulled back the covers so that the fell on the floor. What he saw made him wonder why the hell an idiot like Mustang was his superior officer rather than the other way around.

"Oi, wake up you idiot, you're supposed to dry off before you go to bed" Ed yelled at the shivering form of the Colonel who had decided to go to bed wet and without a shirt.

In response to Ed and his loud mouth Mustang groaned and opened his eyes.

"What is it now Fullmetal? You're a real annoying kid you know that?"

"Well it's your useless ass that lying here half soaked!" Ed replied angrily, trying hard to resist the urge to smother the bastard with his blankets but not really succeeding.

"No one asked you to check on me."

"Yeah right! If I hadn't you'd be lying here till morning came! You'd catch a cold and then you'd probably be even more useless than you are now."

That seemed to strike a nerve for Mustang.

"Don't make it sound like I'm the one that owes _you _Fullmetal."

"Hmpf, I call it like I see it" Ed replied, walking over to the bathroom and returning with a towel which he dumped on top of Mustang's head.

"Now get up and dry off unless you want me to do it again like last time."

Mustang growled softly but he slowly sat up and dried off.

"If your burns hurt then here, use this" Ed said, handing over the burn cream.

He noticed the Colonel's eyes widened slightly at the sight of the cream.

"Don't look at me like that; I went to the afterhours clinic."

Mustang didn't say much in a way of response but either way he grabbed the cream and began applying it to his chest and feet which Ed noticed also had the arrays burned onto the backs.

Holding back the need to grimace, Ed applied a generous amount of cream onto his hand and began rubbing it on the Colonel's back, an action which caused the Colonel to speak up.

"I can-"

"Do it yourself, I know but the rate you're going we'll be up till dawn and I don't know about you but I want to go to bed."

".....no one's-"

"Asking me to stay up. I know but I can't go to sleep with all the lights on anyways."

Ed cut in again resulting in a glare from the Colonel.

"Don't keep looking at me, hurry up and bandage your feet." Ed huffed, slightly embarrassed.

_"Why the hell am I doing this? Oh right, I just explained it."_

Still, even though what Ed had said earlier about going to sleep sooner was true Ed was silently arguing with himself whether or not it was also for another cause.

_"You're worried about him." _

_"Oh shut up, I don't need an inner self, the reason I'm doing this is because if I don't then not only will Hawkeye have my ass but I'll have to drag around a useless bastard with me, which won't do me any good if we get attacked again."_

_"You're also in denial."_

_"Will you just shut up?"_

Any further inner self bashing was put on hold when Mustang suddenly pitched forward. Thankfully, Ed was able to grab his shoulders to keep the Colonel upright.

"Hey! Wait! Don't go to sleep yet, I'm not done."

At Ed's outburst Mustang's eyelids fluttered open and he straightened.

"Just give me a few minutes OK?"

Too tired to argue, Mustang just nodded, crossed his legs on the bed and rested his head in his hands. However, despite his best efforts at staying awake, as soon as Ed was done, Mustang flopped back onto the bed and was asleep before his head even touched the pillow.

"Hey, what about your hands?" Ed asked.

He didn't get an answer since Mustang was dead to the world at the moment. Sighing Ed finished up patching the Colonel up. At least the bastard was nice enough to lie on his back instead of his side like he used to, it made bandaging a lot easier.

A few minutes later and Ed sat back admiring his handy work, if one would call it that. Bandages took the place of a shirt and Ed had bandaged Mustang's forearms a bit below the elbows where the thickest lines ran. However he left the rest of the arm and the legs bare since they only had a few lines. Fingers, toes and heels were also left bare and the burns peeked out from underneath the bandages. It wasn't ideal but Ed didn't think Mustang would appreciate being mummified while he slept so he left everything as was. He noticed that the swelling along the Colonel's eye had reduced and he taped a small bandage just above the Colonel's eyebrow to hide the blackened flesh that was peeling away on his forehead.

_"That should do it. If it still hurts he can get some painkillers tomorrow" _Ed thought to himself as he tidied up.

When finished he grabbed a pen and some paper and began roughly sketching the arrays he had seen on the Colonel's body. He had committed them to memory the day before and wanted to write them down otherwise he feared he might forget them.

_"I'll go to the library tomorrow. Maybe they'll have something." _Stuffing the rough sketches in his bag and stepping into the bathroom, intent on taking a much needed shower.

He didn't want to admit it out loud but Ed was fascinated by the arrays. He was an alchemist after all and what alchemist wouldn't be interested in a body sized alchemy array?

When the shower was over Ed went back to the main room only to find the Colonel curled up in a tight ball on his bed. Ed mentally slapped himself; even though they were indoors it was still chilly. This was Briggs after all.

Grabbing the Colonel's blanket that he had thrown on the floor earlier he draped it over the Colonel before turning off the lights and going to bed himself.

_"Today was an.....interesting day I guess"_

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Next chapter will be up soon....

And on a totally random note, if anyone notices any spelling or grammer mistakes feel free to point them out. I don't have a beta reader editing/ correcting this and there's usually some stuff I miss.....


	3. Chapter 3: Informational

Ed woke earlier than he expected but he was eager to start the day. Deciding to not waste any time he quickly got changed, grabbed his wallet and scrawled a note that he placed next to the still sleeping Colonel's night stand.

The Colonel had his head buried in the blankets again with just his hair sticking out but all Ed thought was _"How does he not suffocate to death under there?" _before he was out the door and headed for the library.

Or at least he would have been if he had remembered the sketch he had stuffed in his bag. Scowling he ran back to get it knowing that had the Colonel been awake he'd be laughing his ass off at him.

_"Thank god for small favours."_

When he finally had the sketch he went back out to the library. However, as luck would have it he realized that it wouldn't be open for at least a few more hours.

"If there really is a god out there then I take back my thanks" Ed muttered to himself. Stuffing his hands in his pockets and walking away from the library door.

"Wonder what there is to eat around here."

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Several hours after Ed left, Mustang woke up to the hustle and bustle of the town. Yawning before sitting up and rubbing the sleep from his eyes he turned to find a note on his night table that simple read:

"Library.  
–shrimp"

Mustang would have laughed at the signature if he didn't have this gut feeling telling him that Ed was at the library to do research on his arrays.

"Stupid kid, he could have just asked." Mustang said to himself. Granted he probably wouldn't tell the shrimp much but it'd be better than wasting a whole day in a library which Roy felt was an extremely boring way to pass the time.

Still, Roy realized that he pretty much had the whole day to himself, at least what was left of it. Normally that would have caused a smile to creep onto his face but instead he groaned upon realizing that he'd have to check in with Hawkeye who would question him as to why he was calling a day late. He also had that report to finish that was probably over due by now.

"I'll blame it on the mail service around here."

Having finally gotten off the bed he realized how hungry he was. He hadn't eaten anything in the past 2 days and it was past lunch time now.

"First things first then."

Roy reached for a shirt but, realizing that he'd ripped it apart to bandage Ed, just grabbed his wallet and coat and went out the door.

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One clothes store and a ramen take out store later and he was back in his hotel room waiting for Hawkeye to pick up the phone on the other end.

"General Mustang's office. Lieutenant Hawkeye speaking."

"Morning Lieutenant." Roy slurred through the ramen he was quickly devouring.

"Sir? What are you doing? And why are you late?"

"Sorry, I realized a man shouldn't be eating when he's talking to a beautiful lady." Roy replied with a grin, putting down the ramen.

"Why are you late?"

Roy sighed, always the formal one his lieutenant was.

"Well, Fullmetal and I ran into an uhh obstacle and got to town later than expected. Nothing big, we were already ahead of schedule so a few lost days won't harm the assignment."

"Agreed sir but may I ask what this obstacle was?"

"....I think a better answer would have been _who_ this obstacle was"

"It was a homunculus wasn't it sir?"

".....Naw, don't be silly, of course it wasn't." Mustang lied.

_"Sir..." _Hawkeye pressed through the phone. Roy got this mental image of her narrowing her eyes and pointing a gun at him and he gulped reflexively.

"....Yes?"

_"Geez, even over the phone she's dangerous"_

"Are you injured?"

"....No, we barely got a scratch, both of us....honestly!"

"Are you lying?"

_"Damn she's good."_

".... Possibly." Roy replied, scratching his head slightly in embarrassment. "It's not that bad, though, I've just got a few burns and Fullmetal's got some broken fingers and a few cuts. We got them treated last night."

Roy heard Hawkeye sigh over the phone, whether it was a relieved or exasperated sigh he couldn't tell.

"The Fuhrer will be expecting a full report sir."

"Of course, I've already sent the first half of it. I'll record the previous day's activities and send them over soon."

"You haven't even started any of it have you?"

_"How does she **do** that?"_

"That's not true! I've written some.....not a lot but still! Fullmetal hasn't written anything!" Roy said honestly. He really _had_ written some.....if you stress the word "some"....and it wasn't like Ed was doing any better.

Roy heard Hawkeye give another sigh. This one he was sure was exasperated and he huffed. It wasn't _his _fault reports took so much time and effort to write.

"I wish you well then. Good bye and sir?"

"Hmm?" Roy asked, having already started to dig in to his ramen which was being to turn cold.

"Stay safe."

Roy smiled. "I'll try my best Lieutenant." He said as he hung up.

_"Better start that report."_

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While Mustang was trying hard to maintain his dignity with Hawkeye, Ed was busy devouring book after book. For the first hour he'd been there he had been aimlessly wandering the shelves. The library was rather small, especially compared to the military library back in Central and Ed wasn't exactly surprised that he didn't find anything of use in the Alchemy section although he was a bit disappointed.

Soon after that he had went to ask a librarian for help, showing her his sketch of the circles. The librarian gave him a funny look as if she remembered seeing the drawing before but said nothing of it. Instead she gave Ed directions to a section of the library that might have something.

"Have you seen this before?" Ed asked.

"I believe so but I can't be certain; from what I remember I'm just surprised a little boy like you knows about something like this. It'll do you no good chasing fairy tales, remember that."

Confused and biting his tongue to keep from yelling at the "little boy" remark, Ed followed the directions the librarian gave him.

Eventually he found himself browsing the shelves in the mythology section and, as luck would have it there was a book that caught almost immediately caught his eye. It was an old book, bound in red leather and the pages were delicately sewn together. It didn't seem to have a title but what Ed noticed was that the book's front, spine and back was covered with symbols.....symbols that strangely resembled alchemic array like the ones he had sketched out.

Normally he wouldn't really be reading mythology, it wasn't even real. However, this was the closest lead he had so after grabbing the book he made himself comfortable on a nearby couch and began reading.

_Centuries ago there lived two men named Fire and Thunder who had extraordinary powers. With their powers they could make fire and lightning rain down from the sky, manipulate their elements at will and destroy everyone and everything it their paths. Every step Thunder took echoed with a resonating **"Boom" **which could be heard from villages far and wide and Fire could make his flames last for years. Even water was reduced to steam when Fire touched it. _

_Thunder could run on clouds at the speed of sound and fire could easily fly on a fireball at the speed of light making them appear like they were never there when disaster struck although everyone knew they were the cause. Villagers would see them silhouetted against the moon but one blink and their whole village was gone. They refrained from killing, finding it much more amusing to see the villagers kill themselves out of fear and material things like land ownership and money now that they had lost everything._

_They were demons in their own right and the duo spread fear into the hearts of villagers leaving a path of destruction in their wake. They were greedy men who craved power and lusted for bloodshed. Eventually, their actions aroused the watchful eyes of the Devil who decided to make a deal with the two brothers._

_The Devil would grant the brothers immortality in exchange for their services. Fire and Thunder, eager for power, agreed instantly and served the Devil for generations. However, eventually the two men no longer wanted to serve the Devil, they wanted to be in control of their lives again and do things their own way like before. Therefore, one night they decided to make waste of the Devil, thus freeing them from their pact. _

_However, the Devil was a smart demon, and could not be easily defeated for he had been ruler of the Underworld since the beginning of time. Therefore, when Fire and Thunder foolishly attacked him he had the darkness that filled all demons' hearts swallow them up from the inside. _

_Fire and Thunder were left feeling all the pain and suffering inflicted on everyone in the history of the world, both physically and mentally. The darkness consumed them, ate away at their insides and eventually killed them. While the whole time the Devil smiled and watched eventually sealing away their abilities in small urns._

_Generations passed, Fire and Thunder's roles in the Devil's ranks were replaced and the humans, over time, adapted to the Devil's ways. Realizing that they were being loosing the eternity long war between dark and light the Devil disguised himself as a human and walked the Earth amongst them. He gave away Fire and Thunder's powers to villages claiming it was a sacred urn given to them from the gods._

_The foolish humans believed the Devil. Believing that the gods had given them powers to overthrow the Devil they unleashed Fire and Thunder's powers on themselves. However, humans are weak creatures, they hide their weaknesses and appear strong but in reality they just never know when to give up. _

_The combined powers of Fire and Thunder destroyed the humans, sending them into an era of darkness, death and destruction. The Devil and his demons ruled that era with an iron fist but this reign was short lived. A man named Light was given knowledge from the gods themselves. He learned how to harness and control the powers of Fire and Thunder and use it against the Devil's wishes. _

_However, Light said that he could not do it on his own. Instead he required the use of two others, ones with extraordinary will power, confidence in their abilities and above all a kind heart. When two men were found Light bound Fire and Thunder's powers to their bodies using shapes and symbols which were a result from the knowledge he had gained._

_The reborn Fire and Thunder overthrew the Devil and his demons after many years of harsh fighting. Eventually a wave of peace and prosperity was brought back to the world and the humans rejoiced. Light went back to the place where he once came and the new Fire and Thunder vowed to use their powers only for good. When they couldn't; they would pass the knowledge on to the previous generations until the ends of time. _

"Well that was a load of crock," Ed muttered to himself after closing the book.

The book was illustrated with numerous pictures, and Ed found himself laughing at the possibility that the large, muscular men depicted in the pictures was Mustang.

_"Yeah right, there's no such thing as devils and gods." _Ed told himself. Although he couldn't deny the fact that the symbols depicted on the covers of the book and in the pictures themselves looked very similar to his sketches of Mustang's arrays.

"Hmm, maybe whoever invented this story was an alchemist or maybe the array was based off this story."

Thinking that that was a very good possibility Ed began pouring over the book's pictures once more. The first Fire looked like an ogre, his skin was fire red and his whole body was surrounded by flames making him look like a giant fireball. Other pictures depicted him with fireballs surrounding him in mid air and him riding what looked like a streaking comet which Ed assumed was him "flying at the speed of light."

Turning the pages over there were some rather gory pictures of the ogre-like Fire burning holes through people's heads and stomachs as they struggled weakly to get away.

_"No one said mythology was pretty I guess." _Ed told himself, flipping to the end of the book and looking at the "reborn" Fire.

At least the new Fire was more likeable. He was your typical body builder looking guy and at least he looked human.

_"Still Major Armstrong might be able to pull this off but defiantly not Mustang." _

The new Fire simply had flames covering his feet and hands rather than his whole body but as Ed flipped through he noticed that the fireballs the new Fire created were much bigger giving the impression that he was much more powerful than the old one. There was even a scene of Fire with his hands stretched outwards generating two massive fire cyclones that incinerated a good hundred plus demons

_"If Mustang can do that then I'll be impressed."_

_"Not that he can of course since demons don't exist ......dammit, am I in denial again?"_

Seeing as a conversation with himself was not helping his sanity Ed decided to run over everything he had learned so far.

_".....I've learned nothing, myths aren't real but for now I'll assume that it's loosely based on fact or the other way around....Hmm, well, the array is powerful, that much is known, it could have possibly been derived from this myth, it could possibly give the user superhuman abilities but then where's the science in that? On top of that why Mustang of all people?"_

"Ahh, this is stupid." Ed said out loud to himself.

"umm, excuse me?" a female voice spoke up.

Ed jumped and whirled around. Had the person heard him talking to himself and was asking what was wrong with him?

"Sorry to bother you but the library will be closing in 5 min."

"....." Ed mentally slapped himself out of his surprise and managed a smile.

"Thanks, do you think I could take this out for a one night loan?" Ed asked, flashing his pocket watch.

_"It's about time I asked that bastard some questions."_

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When Ed got back to the hotel room the Colonel was nowhere to be found. Instead, was a nicely written multi page report sitting on the desk with a note beside it that read:

"Sign. Mail. Dining room.  
-Bastard"

_"Did he do my part too?"_ Ed wondered, flipping over the pages. After the first two sentences he got bored, flipped to the front and just signed his name. Mustang most likely did do his part, probably feeling that if Ed did it himself he'd screw it up and the Colonel would lose valuable promotion points.

_"Whatever, saves me the effort."_

After stuffing the report in the already addressed envelope provided Ed went downstairs to the lobby to get it mailed. Afterwards he spent a few minutes looking for the dining hall and a few more minutes looking for Mustang.

"There you are!" Ed shouted at last causing a surprised Mustang to choke on his tea.

"Geez, why the hell are there so many people here? I can't see anything." Ed said mostly to himself. Sitting down in a huff and looking over the diner menu.

"Well maybe if you weren't so short you would be able to see past people."

"Who did you call so short that one has to be looked through a magnifying glass to actually be seen?!"

"You obviously." Mustang replied without looking up from his steak, a smirk already on his pompous face.

Ed growled at him before placing an order over to one of the waiters.

The rest of dinner was spent in relative silence. It would have felt like every other day if it wasn't for the fact that whenever Mustang looked up Ed would quickly avert his eyes away from him and concentrate on the grilled salmon in front of him.

After a few more times of this Mustang was starting to get annoyed, sure his face had seen better days but it would it be too much to ask for Fullmetal to just look at him without looking like he wanted to puke?

"If you've got something to say then say it."

Ed widened his eyes and blushed, embarrassed that he'd been caught looking at the Colonel's wounds.

"No it's nothing it's just.....uhh..." Ed trailed off, uncertain of what to say.

"You went to the library."

"....Yeah...."

"What'd you find?"

Ed blinked up at Mustang.

_"He knows why I went. That bastard just knows everything doesn't he?" _Ed thought to himself. Granted, it was rather obvious why he'd gone but it still angered Ed that Mustang knew could read him inside out.

"None of your business." Ed eventually replied causing the Colonel to raise an eyebrow.

"Oh really? If you're planning on trying it out yourself then you can forget it."

"Who said I wanted to try it out?!" Ed replied angrily while stuffing salmon into his mouth and chewing furiously.

"I try to avoid doing stupid things like burning myself on purpose." Ed added between bites.

"......You don't have to burn yourself...." Mustang replied after some tense silence.

Ed raised an eyebrow at his comment.

".....You could use marker. That's what I did last time...."

Ed just raised his eyebrow higher at that.

"......in Ishval...." Mustang finished, looking away from Ed and stuffing some of his steak into his mouth.

"Why'd you burn yourself this time?" Ed asked, deciding it would be best not to press the events in the past and instead focused on the present.

"Brilliant idea Fullmetal, I'll just ask my opponent to take a coffee break while I buy a marker and draw alchemy circles all over my skin." Mustang replied sarcastically. "At the moment I was kinda in a rush you know."

Ed got a brief mental image of Lust sitting on the ground drinking coffee while Mustang attempted to quickly draw circles on his back in the middle of nowhere. He suppressed his snicker with another forkful of salmon. Hopefully Mustang wouldn't notice.

"You didn't answer my question." Mustang said calmly after a few minutes of silence.

"And what question was that?" Ed replied.

"What'd you find?"

"Nothing, just some mythology book."

If Mustang was surprised he didn't show it. Instead simply sipped his tea and gave a small "Oh really?"

".....you know it?" Ed asked

"Perhaps."

"What kind of answer is that?!" Ed growled

Mustang sighed, was Fullmetal actually expecting him to tell him everything?

_"I guess I kinda owe the kid though....."_

"What do you really want to know Fullmetal?"

Ed pushed his salmon away and straightened, looking at the Colonel full on.

"I want to know what that array is, what it can do, why you used it, how you used it, where did you learn about it and above all, why you?" Ed said.

Mustang sighed again. This was going to be a pain explaining.

"I don't feel like giving a science lesson so I'll keep this simple Fullmetal. The basic science behind my alchemy is that I can manipulate the concentration of oxygen in the surrounding air when I rub my gloves together thus raising the oxygen's density to a level at which becomes combustible. After the initial spark I can manipulate the ensuing flame to my will. I am also able to separate oxygen atoms from hydrogen atoms in water molecules, isolating the two combustible gases. Are you with me so far?"

Ed nodded like a little boy at school learning his ABCs and Mustang continued.

"Good, now, the array is designed to repeatedly and constantly manipulate oxygen's density level around me without the need of me snapping my fingers. At the time of activation the entire area around me sparks and becomes a ball of fire that I can then manipulate to my will at very powerful levels. If I snap my fingers that only generates one spark per snap. However, if I were to be surrounded by several hundred sparks then the power levels fluctuate greatly. Think of me snapping a hundred times per second, every second." Mustang added, looking at the rather confused, if not rather amusing, face that Fullmetal had pulled on him.

"So you literally become a ball of fire." Ed said thinking about the pictures of Fire in the mythology book.

"I guess you could say that but I can manipulate the form too."

"Why don't you use this all the time then? With marker I mean."

"I don't feel like getting a body tattoo Fullmetal. Besides, it takes a lot of effort and energy to harness the power. If I used it for every enemy we've ever faced my body wouldn't be able to hold up from the strain."

_"So that's why he's been so tired lately."_

"Who taught you this?"

Mustang raised an eyebrow at that.

"My teacher of course, just like how you have a teacher, I had one too you know."

"Why on Lust? "

"Because she was an enemy obviously, and a tough one at that." Mustang replied, swallowing the last bit of his steak before getting up.

"Now, I'm going to bed, I recommend you finish that before it gets cold." Mustang stated, pointing to Ed's half finished grilled salmon.

"Wait!"

"Do you ever run out of questions Fullmetal?" Mustang sighed.

"Just tell me why you of all people were given this knowledge."

"....who knows." Mustang said in reply before turning and walking out of the dining room. However Ed heard him mumble to himself while he was leaving.

"He required the use of two others, ones with extraordinary will power, confidence in their abilities and above all a kind heart."

"Pfft, don't flatter yourself bastard." Ed shouted after him. Sitting down and finishing up his salmon.

_"I guess I learned a lot today."_

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

I'm expecting one or two more chapters. This chapter was a real bore for me to write since all I did was explain stuff _ Although the Roy and Riza talk was kinda fun. As a heads up, keep the myth in mind! ^_^;


	4. Chapter 4: Just Plain Old Sucked pt 1

Wow, sorry I haven't updated this, first semester of school was so damn troublesome. But now, with 2nd semester just started, I'm back on track and re-motivated to finish this. Hope my reviews haven't given up on me.

* * *

The next few days Ed and Roy went back to their everyday routine that they'd been perfecting since the start of their stupid mission. Wake up, walk to the next town, sleep and repeat. Ed's wounds had healed fairly well and he kept any concerns and questions to himself. Mustang also didn't reveal any more information.

Suffice to say, if they ignored the fact that Mustang seemed to always be tired and the fact that Ed's broken fingers will still driving him crazy, everything was status quo. Days passed easily and surprisingly without incident and eventually Ed and Roy found themselves staring ahead at the outlines of Briggs Headquarters and its surrounding mountains.

"Well, it's about time!" Ed shouted enthusiastically, happy to have finally made it. "It took us 2 weeks, 12 blizzards and 50 thousand towns but we're finally here! On time too." Ed added sounding proud of himself at that.

"Don't get too excited Fullmetal, the hardest part is yet to come. We're on the brink of war as it is." Roy decided to point out after Ed's happy outbursts.

"You just love killing the mood don't you?" Ed asked, glaring at the Colonel.

Roy didn't say anything in response, but he did look rather happy that today marked the end of having to trudge through the snow with a small -and loud- companion.

It was then that the boom of cannons resonated throughout the clearing completely destroying any happy mood that had lingered.

"_What the hell?!" _

Ed's heart clenched painfully as he took off towards the direction of the headquarters and the noise.

"_No! We were on time! They couldn't possibly have been able to reach Briggs faster than us! This is my fault, they'd know something would be up if Lust didn't go back to them. No, I should have known the homunculus were here as soon as she showed up. We should have moved faster. We shou-_

Major?!

And sure enough, Ed's inner monologue was cut short when suddenly, Major Armstrong, the last person Ed had thought to see here of all places, burst through the shadows of the surrounding trees and ran towards him.

"Edward! How wonderful it is to see you!" Armstrong exclaimed, ready to scoop down and give Ed a hug.

However, Armstrong's booming voice was drowned out by yet another cannon blast and his usual sparkling self quickly became more serious.

"Is Colonel Mustang with you?"

"Yeah, yeah, I'm here. Mind slowing down a bit there Fullmetal?"

Ed turned to see a slightly out of breath colonel behind him. In his mad dash to get closer to headquarters he hadn't realized that Mustang had been following.

"Face it old man, you're way past your prime" Ed grinned at Mustang who just rolled his eyes, attention already shifting to focus on Major Armstrong who snapped a quick salute.

"What are you doing here Major? Weren't you meant to be stationed in Central?" Mustang asked.

"Yes sir but Briggs requested backup due to the surprising attack by the homunculus. Many soldiers, including I, took a military train to one of the many safe holds located in Briggs and managed to ride a tank the rest of the way. That might explain how we got here a bit faster than you two."

Ed nodded his consent. The information fit. He was sure the army would have easily managed to get a train to carry several military officers across the country if the situation was desperate. The tank wasn't too farfetched either, if the Major General kept a tank in her house why couldn't she keep some in the safe holds surrounding Briggs?

Mustang on the other hand didn't look too happy with the information but he knew time was short so when Major Armstrong beckoned for the two to follow, he went along.

Ed looked over at Mustang who appeared to be boring holes into the major's back.

"What's eating you?" Ed whispered when he dropped back enough so that he was walking beside the Colonel.

The Colonel immediately snapped out of it and looked down at Ed.

"Nothing" he stated simply breaking his gaze with the major.

Ed sighed "Relax geez, looks like you've got a stick up your ass or something"

Roy glared at him but didn't reply. Ed blinked, no smirk, no short joke not even a threat of burning off valuable body parts? Now Ed knew something was wrong.

"How's your sister by the way Major?"

"She's doing well, or at least as well as she can be given our current situation" came the smooth reply. Ed looked at Mustang who simply gave a false smile to Armstrong and nodded as they kept walking.

"That's good then....Even though I never really did specify which sister I was talking about."

Ed focused all his attention on the Major who seemed unfazed by his supposed slip up

"But of course Colonel, I had naturally assumed you meant the Major General seeing as to how you have not ever met any of my other sisters." Replied Armstrong, not missing a beat.

"_No tensing, pausing, stuttering, he didn't even falter a step. That has to be Armstrong." _Ed thought to himself.

However, Mustang did not look the least bit satisfied; instead he even seemed tenser than before.

The tense silence seemed to stretch on forever. Finally, Mustang spoke up.

"So you came here via train from central huh?"

"_You idiot! We've already established that!"_ Ed was resisting the urge to smack his forehead.

"Yes, I believe we've established that Colonel Mustang." Came the sparkly cheerful reply.

"Only Armstrong's that sparkly, that's for sure" Ed grinned to himself. Gaining his confidence he rushed up to Armstrong hoping the Major wasn't too put off by all the questioning.

"_Mustang's wound up too tight. Maybe the office should pitch in so he can spend some vacation time......in a retirement home."_ Ed thought to himself just as he heard the distinct sound of oxygen combusting and saw a red flame zip past him to explode a few feet in front of Armstrong.

"And the third one's the charm" Mustang muttered to himself.

* * *

"Hey, Colonel Stupid! What the fuck do you think you're doing?!" Ed screamed at Mustang, beside himself with rage.

"Protecting your ass Fullmetal now back up. He's going to start taking me seriously. Aren't you Envy?"

Envy, still in Armstrong's body, grinned madly. Ed felt a shiver run down his spine at the sight of such a grin on the Major's face. Quickly, he retreated a few feet to be closer to the Colonel and got into a fighting stance. He was going to be in for a shitty day.

"Now now Mustang, I must say I'm impressed. Are you usually this paranoid around your subordinates?" Envy asked after a brief silence. Slowly, he changed his appearance back to his default body.

Roy chose to ignore the question all together. "You slipped up Envy. Not that I'm willing to share them with the likes of you. You ready to be defeated again?"

Envy grinned again "Hardly, I've still got a bone to pick with you for last time. Now that was just embarrassing. Too bad Hughes isn't around to-"

The rest of Envy's sentence was interrupted by a huge fire blast that knocked him backwards into the snow. Healing quickly and getting up his face was drawn up into yet another grin.

"Still a touchy subject huh Mustang? Too bad. I think I like this body even more now." Envy exclaimed and both Roy and Ed's eyes widened when right before their eyes, Envy changed into the very form of Maes Hughes, knives and all.

It took Roy a good few seconds to register who it was and another few more the register that a knife had just been thrown at him. Snapping out of it he managed to dodge it by a hair and sent another streak of fire towards Envy flinching slightly when he watched his best friend burn.

"_He's dead. Dead and gone, that's not Maes. He would never attack me. That's not Maes. It can't be."_

Roy's repeated this inner mantra to himself while causing explosion after explosion before Envy's body had time to completely regenerate.

However, Roy's trigger happy spree was put to an end when suddenly, Envy changed into a form that was all too familiar to him.

"_Riza?!"_

Ed frantically looked over to Mustang who had completely frozen where he stood, eyes wide but fingers still ready to snap.

However, when Envy raised a gun towards him and Mustang didn't make a move, Ed knew it was time to take matters into his own hands. Without even thinking, Ed slapped his hands together, wincing slightly in pain when he remembered his broken fingers. Quickly, he slammed his hands onto the snow covered ground causing it to rise and fall down in a large, indestructible wave, slamming into a surprised Envy and all but drowning him.

Never the less, Ed still heard a shot ring out and, heart in his throat, whipped his head around over to Mustang.

Roy snapped out of it when he heard the telltale sounds of alchemy being preformed and had just barely managed to get out of the way of the incoming bullet, hissing softly when he felt it nick his shoulder.

Snapping his fingers yet again, Roy directed a flame towards the large lump of snow in front of him and watched as the flame melted the snow away and zoned in on their target.

Roy watched as his loyal lieutenant burned and screamed in agony within his flame. Sick to the stomach he closed his eyes tightly and turned away.

Not a good move.

"Mustang! Look out!"

Roy had less than a second to respond before he was all but tackled to the ground by Edward, both narrowly missing the large ball of meat that seemed to have come flying from behind.

Roy landed heavily on his injured shoulder but bit back a cry of pain. Recovering fast and getting back on his feet, Roy realized that the supposedly flying tub of meat was none other than Gluttony, sporting a rather clueless expression that to some people would have deemed cute if it wasn't so disturbing.

"You've got to be kidding me! How many of you guys did that old man send out here?" Ed exclaimed, having also gotten to his feet.

"Relax Fullmetal, we wouldn't want it to be anything less than a fair fight."

"Yeah, says _you_, its times like these that I'd rather take the easy way out."

And Roy couldn't help but agree to that statement.

"How are your fingers? Think you can take the palm tree there?" Roy asked, not really wanting to deal with said palm tree. He'd probably get nightmares of his subordinates burned to death for the next little while.

"_No, don't think that. Snap out of it dammit!"_

"Hell yeah, anything you can do I can do better." Ed answered, oblivious to Roy's mental struggle, instead clapping his hands together and drawing out his automail blade.

Roy couldn't help but smirk at Ed's reply but he quickly sobered himself when Envy, still in his lieutenant's body, stood up and gave him a smile.

"Let's go!" Ed exclaimed loudly, running up to the pair of homunculus, swinging his blade at Envy.

Envy, graceful as ever, did a back flip and tried to shoot Ed from the air. Dodging bullets left and right Ed transmuted ice spears from the snow and sent them hurling towards Envy. Unable to dodge in mid air the spears met their mark and Envy fell to the ground reverting back to his default body.

"Envy!" Gluttony cried out, running towards Ed to try and take him out. However his path was disrupted by a massive explosion that sent Gluttony tumbling the other direction.

"Sorry but your opponent is me." Roy told him stepping in between Gluttony and Envy's fight.

"Huh? Who are you? Can I eat you?" Gluttony asked innocently.

"_I have to keep him from getting angry or else he'll open up that Gate of Truth." _Roy told himself.

Deciding to play along he said, in a far too of a sweet voice "Sorry, your Father won't let you eat me. I'm The Flame Alchemist. Remember? One of the sacrifices?"

Remembering to keep his actual name out of it since that was what had triggered Gluttony's rather terrifying true form the first time they had met.

Gluttony looked dumbly at Roy for several beats but Roy was quick to break the silence.

"Here, let me remind you." Roy said and soon, Gluttony was soaring through the sky while on fire after a resonating boom.

Not giving Gluttony a chance to recover, Roy was quick to deliver several snaps in quick succession towards his target making sure not to send him too close to Envy's battle with Ed.

As long as he kept the two separated, Gluttony most likely wouldn't remember the fact that since the Promised Day was over, Father didn't need the sacrifices anymore so technically, he **was** allowed to eat him.....Roy just hoped that he would be able to finish Gluttony off by then.

"_If a guy needs to die 100 times so he'll die and __**stay**__ dead then this is going to take a while." _Roy thought to himself. But hey, the great thing about fire alchemy was that Roy didn't have to put so much effort into every attack. It sure beat Ed's active style of fighting. More so, if Gluttony never opened his Gate then he wouldn't have any long range attacks to defend himself with.

"_Gluttony: 0, Roy: 2."_

Roy just hoped that Edward wasn't having too difficult of a time.

* * *

Suffice to say, Edward was having a very difficult time. He could deal with the small cuts and bruises he had received so far and the sting his fingers gave off whenever he clapped his hands but it was just that Envy refused to stay still damn it!

"Looks like you've gotten smarter Envy! I guess it would be too much to ask if you just grew your body a bit bigger so I could land a few hits huh?" Ed yelled out, panting slightly.

Irritatingly, he couldn't get a clear shot at him no matter what he tried and he was getting tired trying to avoid Envy's own attacks.

"What's the matter shorty? Getting tired?"

Thankfully, Ed always had his short temper to fuel his energy levels.

"Shorty? SHORTY?!"

"Yeah, pipsqueak was getting kinda old."

"Who you calling shorty? Can a shorty do **this**?" Ed yelled out. Slapping his hands together and then hitting the ground.

Instantly, the thick snow around him melted only to be quickly frozen, effectively trapping Envy before Ed set the now ice into spears that pierced through Envy's body.

"Pipsqueak not enough?! What else do you want to call me, a half-pint, beanstalk, midget? It's not my fault that everyone's so damn tall. I'm still growing you kn-"

"_Mom!?"_

Sure enough where a frozen and punctured Envy used to be was now the split image of Trisha Elric.

Ed froze. Sure, he had been expecting Envy to take the form of one of his loved ones but he had been expecting Al or maybe even Winry, defiantly not the woman that sat, torn and bloody in front of him.

While Ed was frozen he did not notice that Envy had expanded his arm so that it broke through the ice encasing it. Suddenly, the image of Trisha Elric changed yet again to Riza Hawkeye and before Ed could even react, a gun had been brought up in one swift motion and went off.

"Get down Fullmetal!" Was yelled at him and he was tackled to the ground by none other than Roy Mustang. Unfortunately, the ground below them was and covered in ice thanks to Ed's earlier transmutation and the momentum of Roy's tackle sent the two past the row of trees surrounding the clearing and down a little hill.

During all the tumbling Ed swore one of finger's splint broke but his mind was still too full of the terrifying image of his mother to care.

Realizing that he was being shaken he raised his slightly unfocused eyes towards whoever it was before something cold and wet struck him across the face.

That had gotten his attention.

"What the hell do you think you doing you bastard?!" Ed screamed, fear and confusion turning into anger and annoyance.

Ed didn't miss what sounded like a relieved sigh come from the Colonel. He also didn't miss the fact that they were in a deep snow bank and that he had just been slapped across the cheek by Mustang.

"_Wait, cold and __**wet**__?" _

Ed quickly looked towards the Colonel's gloves and sure enough they were soaked, most likely due to having landed in a snow bank at the base of a small hill.

"Will you stop staring at things Fullmetal? I need you focused." Mustang said grunting softly in pain as he sat up.

"You were shot?!" Ed exclaimed, also shifting from his lying down position to a sitting one.

"That's not important, your fingers are a mess, and we need a new plan," was the curt reply.

Before Ed even had a chance to reply, Mustang continued.

"I'll fend the two off while you go run and get help."

"Yeah and how the hell are you gonna do that? Your gloves are wet and you've been fucking shot ...._twice_!"

"That first one just nicked me"

"That doesn't make it not count!"

"So that's where you two ended up. How's the weather down there pipsqueak?" Ed shot to his feet and looked towards the top of the hill where Envy in his default body and a rather sad looking Gluttony stood.

"Oh so we're back to pipsqueak now are we?!" Ed yelled at them.

Roy swore that if Ed had been on a mountain he would have caused an avalanche. Needless to say, he also got to his feet and faced the pair, back towards Ed.

"Alright Ed, like I said, you go and I'll hold em off, no arguing" Mustang told him, taking off his gloves.

"Like hell they'll be no arguing! I'm not going anywhere!"

However Ed soon realized that the Colonel was tearing off the old bandages that covered his hands exposing the burnt flesh underneath from his previous fight.

"Whoa, wait a minute, you're not thinking of..." Ed started.

"Just go" Mustang growled before clapping his hands together.

Ed, being the stubborn kid that he was, didn't move. Instead he watched in stunned fascination when Mustang's hands practically lit up with alchemic light. The light soon spread throughout the rest of his body even reaching up through the burn marks on his face so that it surrounded his right eye.

In what felt like several minutes but Ed assumed had only been a few seconds, the light faded. And there stood the Colonel, flames billowing around him seeming to concentre mainly on his hands and eye. It was so hot Ed swore the snow under them was melting away, water evaporating to produce steam which rose all around them.

"You know if you were anyone else that'd look kinda cool right?" Ed told him backing up a bit to get away from the intense heat. "How the hell do you burn un in there?"

The Colonel threw him a withering glare. "I told you to go." He responded, ignoring the question all together.

"Yeah well, too bad. I'm staying right here so when you fuck this up royally I'll get to make fun of you for the rest of your life."

The Colonel simply rolled his eyes in response before turning his attention back to the two homunculi.

"Ooohh, pretty colors. Envy, can I eat him?" Gluttony asked, face breaking out into a big grin, drool and all.

"Knock yourself out Gluttony. He's all yours."

In an excited squeal, Gluttony launched himself up into the air with every intention of crashing back down on top of the Colonel. The impact when Gluttony hit the ground caused a huge avalanche of snow to erupt, knocking Ed backwards and to the ground.

When the snow cleared there was no sign of the Colonel.

"Where'd he go? Don't tell me Gluttony ate him already."

However, Gluttony looked just as confused as Ed, turning his head right and left. He never the saw the orange blur that had appeared behind him until it was too late.

But Ed did _"Holy shit he's fast!"_

In one smooth motion Mustang had plunged his hand right through Gluttony's back, his flame burning right through Gluttony's skin until Roy's arm had made a hole right through the center of Gluttony's body.

Screaming in pain, Gluttony swung his arm at Mustang but it was caught with Roy's other hand. Immediately, it too started to burn off and Gluttony screamed harder.

"Let go of him bastard!" Envy screamed from behind, throwing himself at Roy, arms already transformed to those from his real body.

Instantly, Roy let go of Gluttony and within a second had concentrated his flames to his feet and practically disappeared.

"What the hell?!" Envy screamed out, crashing into a healing Gluttony. Both homunculi tumbled to the floor, wind knocked out.

Roy backed off from the two homunculi for a while and Ed heard him mutter. "Damn, I missed."

"What the hell is he aiming for?" Ed wondered.

In those few moments however, Envy had transformed his arm longer and tried to grab at Roy from below. Thankfully, before Ed had managed to yell out a warning, Roy dodged it, flames already concentrated to his feet so that he would stay upright. Hell, it was as if he had rockets strapped to his feet.

However, Envy wasn't one to give up so easily making his arm longer so that it curved to follow Roy's movements. Dodging left and right Roy noticed he'd eventually run out of places to run and used his flame to propel himself upwards instead of backwards.

"He can fly?! Humans aren't supposed to fucking fly you know!" Envy screamed out, having already gotten to his feet a while ago. Extending both of his arms towards the human sized fireball above him, he tried yet again to catch Mustang. Needless to say he was furious for allowing Mustang to make a fool of him during the fight.

Unfortunately for him, Mustang managed to dodge everything he threw at him, flying up, around and over Envy's arms at every turn. Either this wasn't the first time Mustang had flown or he had excellent control over his flames.

Roy needed to get rid of Gluttony before he opened up his Gate of Truth and yet he couldn't do that if Envy kept blocking his path. Going onto the offense he summoned a row of fireballs and launched them at Envy.

"Gluttony! I could really use your help here!" Envy screamed at him as a fireball barely missed his head. Even though it had missed, Envy could still feel its heat as it went careening past him.

"_What the heck is with this guy? How'd he get so much power?" _Envy asked himself. He'd seen firsthand what Mustang's flames could do and that had already been powerful enough to defeat Lust and himself. Now they were even stronger and it was downright crazy. Envy would never admit it but he really wasn't looking forward to getting hit by Mustang's flames.

"Come on Gluttony! Open that gate of yours! That's Roy Mustang! Remember? He's the guy that killed Lust!" Envy screamed at him, trying desperately to dodge Mustang's fireballs hurtling towards him.

Gluttony stared at him for a few seconds but then Envy saw the first signs of anger building up within him and grinned.

"Looks like the tables have turned bastard!" Envy screamed at Mustang. Who was also witnessing Gluttony's anger build up.

"ROY MUSTANG!" Gluttony screamed out. Having finally awakened and immediately launched his attack towards him.

Mustang managed to dodge it easily enough but wasn't fast enough to dodge Envy's arm that had come swinging around. It collided with Roy's stomach and he swore he felt a rib crack. The momentum of the punch combined with those his flames generated to keep him in the air sent Roy flying all too quickly in the other direction, perfectly open enough for Gluttony to aim another attack.

"_Shit!" _

Roy wasn't even upright anymore and without knowing where up or down was it was near impossible to plan an evasive manoeuvre around the incoming blast.

"_What goes up must come down"_ and out of panic, that was the best idea Roy could come up with at the moment. Acting quickly, he stopped his alchemy and like what Envy had said earlier, humans were not meant to fly. As soon as the flames were negated Roy dropped like a rock towards the ground, just barely missing Gluttony's attack which had managed to nick part of his uniform.

Roy landed heavily on the ground, wincing as the impact jostled the bullet lodged in the back of his shoulder from when he had saved Ed earlier.

After falling several feet out of the sky, the air had been knocked out of him and he simply lay there for a few moments. The lack of movement on Roy's part gave Envy plenty of time to extend his arm so that it wrapped around Roy's neck and with little effort, Roy was hoisted up into the air.

" Well well well, not so cool now are you?" Envy asked grinning manically. "Let's just finish you off so we can deal by the little mouse hiding in the bushes over there," obviously referring to Ed.

Roy did not respond. Desperately trying to get oxygen into his lungs, hands struggling to claw him out of Envy's grasp. Realizing that this was futile he closed his eyes and concentrated.

"Eh? What's the matter? Give up already? Don't worry, I'll make this quick" Envy told him mockingly, right arm extended, ready to stab it through Roy's chest any second now.

"_Come on Roy, think. One cannot gain anything without first giving something in return."_

Then, everything seemed to happen in a blur. At the same time Envy thrust his arm, with every intention of having it go right through Roy's body, Roy caught it with both hands, orange flames dancing around them.

"_So take my energy and give me power."_

Envy screamed in pain from the intense heat and tried to get out of Mustang's grasp but Roy held on, controlling the flames until it surged up through the arm and engulfed Envy's body.

"You son of a bitch!" Envy yelled at him. Ignoring the pain, Envy used the arm that was holding onto Roy and slammed him head first into the ground. Roy felt like his head had just been hit with a sledgehammer and automatically, his body went limp.

Through watery eyes he watched as Envy lifted him again, head too dazed to control the fire towards the enemy.

His mind registered a streak of red and gold before he was dropped to the ground again, albeit a lot lighter than before.

Someone grabbed him, shook him. "Oi! Snap out of it! Come on! You're burning through my automail!"

Finally, his stunned brain kicked back into action and his eyes cleared.

"Fullmetal?" Roy asked and instantly, the arm that had penetrated his flames to reach him withdrew.

"Finally, I thought Envy had knocked out the rest of your brain cells. You only had so little to start with anyways."

Before Roy could respond he noticed something fast was coming their way.

"Down!" he yelled out. Grabbing onto Ed's automail arm and practically throwing him to the side.

A few seconds later and the place where Ed had stood was literally eaten by Gluttony, leaving a barren piece of land in front of Roy.

"Great. You burned right through my coat AND a good centimetre off my automail! Winry's going to kill me for this." He heard Ed grumble behind him.

"That's what you get for not leaving like I told you to." Roy replied, getting to his feet. "Now stay here and try not to die. You're enough trouble without all the paperwork."

"Pfft, you're welcome by the way," Ed replied.

Roy nodded before sighing. "OK, let's try this again." Roy muttered, more to himself than Ed.

In an instant, he was a blur as he flew towards Gluttony who was still recovering from unleashing his attack earlier.

"_So he needs time to digest before he launches another attack huh?"_

"Careful! He can eat anything that huge eye of his sees," Ed shouted after him.

"_That's it!"_

Roy focused all his attention on Gluttony, forcing his flames to take his faster.

"Roy Mustang!" Gluttony yelled, expelling another blast towards him.

Roy easily moved to the right and dodged the incoming attack.

"_Now!"_

Using all the energy he could, Roy forced his flames to take him even faster, easily coming up behind Gluttony. Before Gluttony could turn around Roy, yet again, punched right though him. Aiming a bit lower than he had previously.

Gluttony screamed in pain, turning this way and that so that he could swallow Roy in his Gate but Roy held on, constantly repositioning his body behind Gluttony.

"_You can't eat what you can't see." _

Finally, Roy's hand closed around his long awaited target. Yanking out the Philosopher's stone from Gluttony's body, Roy watched as the rest of the body turned into dust, which was soon swept up by the wind.

Roy held onto the stone in one fiery hand until the alchemic light emitting from it finally died, having not been given enough time to regenerate before it was killed again by the flames. The stone was soon reduced to a liquid which in turn evaporated within the fire.

"_One down, one more to go"_

Turning his attention to where Envy was fighting Ed, he launched a series of fireballs which danced in the air until they came together and incinerated their target.

In the time it took for Envy's body to regenerate back, Roy was already in front of him, hand around his throat as the other hand stabbed right through Envy, just like with Gluttony earlier. He felt his hand close around Envy's Stone, heard Envy scream in pain, smelt the smell of burned flesh and saw the alchemic light the Stone gave off while desperately trying to regenerate Envy's body. All he had to do was pull the Stone out and yet.....he couldn't.

* * *

Yeah, I know, I hate cliffhangers too but if I hadn't stopped it there this chapter would either be too long or too short. And sorry if this chapter kinda sucked. I've always been bad at writing fight scenes. I'll have the next bit up within a week, promise.


	5. Chapter 5: Just Plain Old Sucked pt2

Ed saw Envy go up in a burst of flame and was relieved to see the Colonel, ready to finish off Envy in one simple move.

However, unlike Roy, he also saw little black hands winding itself up Roy's legs, past his torso and around his arms, effectively stopping Roy's movements before Ed even had time to yell out a warning.

Envy was enjoying the look of pure fear that had spread itself over Mustang's and Ed's features and in one quick motion, slashed his arm right through Roy's chest.

"Colonel!" Ed yelled out, watching the huge spray of blood that had come spewing out of the Colonel's body.

"Now, you've caused us a lot of trouble Mustang, you must understand that I cannot allow you to continue," came an all too eerie voice that made Ed's blood run cold.

Turning his head, he saw the one homunculus he had hoped never to see again.

"Well it's about time Pride! I was starting to think you'd abandoned us!" Envy exclaimed, having fully recovered from Mustang's attack and stepped back several steps away from him.

Envy received no answer. Instead, in one smooth motion Pride's shadows lifted Mustang up into the air.

"Put him down!" Ed yelled, transmuting his blade again and running towards Pride. However Ed's movements were stopped too without even a backwards glance from the homunculus in question.

Roy, noticing that Pride had caught Edward too, launched a series of fireballs towards him. Even though he couldn't move he could still control his flames.

All the fireballs met their target and yet, Pride stepped out of the smoke totally unharmed.

"You cannot hurt me Roy Mustang. To be quite honest with you I was quite surprised that Fire's abilities have lived on for so long. Hohenhiem really outdid himself finding successors. I should have known the knowledge would be passed down to you. After all, you are the Flame Alchemist are you not?" Pride said, an all too evil smile already on his boyish face.

Both Roy's and Ed's eyes widened.

"Hold on a minute! How do you know about that stupid myth?! And what's this got to do with that bastard Hohenheim?" Ed exclaimed, still rooted to the spot.

Pride finally turned his attention to Ed.

"Oh, so you too are aware of the roles of Fire and Thunder. It is no myth; the very basics of all stories are derived from truth Edward Elric."

Turning slightly so that he was talking to both Roy and Ed, Pride continued.

"Have you two still not figured it out?" Pride asked, taking in their shocked expressions. "Fire and Thunder were the first Lust and Greed....."

"....And **I** was the darkness that swallowed them up. Same as what I will now do to you Roy Mustang."

Ed's mind instantly flashed to the many lines from the myth.

"_They were __**greed**__y men who craved power and __**lust**__ed for bloodshed......"_

"_....The darkness swallowed them up from the inside. Fire and Thunder were left feeling all the pain and suffering inflicted on everyone in the history of the world, both physically and mentally. The darkness consumed them, ate away at their insides and eventually killed them...."_

The air was soon pierced by a scream of agony and Ed instantly snapped his head towards the sound, horrified at what he saw.

There was Mustang, supported in the air by Pride's shadows, bleeding from the mouth, nose and ears. He was crying out from the pain, doubled over, eyes wide and hands clutching his head.

"Colonel!" Ed yelled before being cut off by Pride.

"Do not worry Edward, you will receive the same punishment later. For now, simply watch as one of your friends dies before you while you are hopeless to watch."

Ed glared at Pride who had the nerve to smile at him, eyes twinkling with pure joy at the two alchemist's pain.

"_Shit! This is my fault, I should have listened to Mustang and gone for help, and then we wouldn't be in this predicament. No, this isn't the time! Come on Ed, think! Why didn't that stupid book tell us how the demons were defeated?!"_

Ed closed his eyes, concentrating, maybe there'd been a clue in that myth, in the words? Pictures?

"....._The reborn Fire and Thunder overthrew the Devil and his demons after many years of harsh fighting..... Light went back to the place where he once came.... passed on from generation to generation.....Dammit! That didn't help at al- Wait! That's it!"_

"MUSTANG! LIGHT!" Ed screamed at the top of his lungs, hoping that his voice would reach the Colonel.

"Pfft, how can Hohenhiem of Light possibly help you?" Pride asked, probably amused at Ed's stupidity.

Ed ignored him.

"You idiot! You gonna let a little kid like that whip your ass?!"

"_Fire, is the result of oxidation through combustion"_

"You're going to be the fucking Fuhrer aren't you?! You just gonna let all that progress go to waste?!"

"_The temperature of flames can be assessed by their color."_

"What about Hughes?! What about Havoc?! You promised you'd meet him at the top remember?!"

"_So the hotter the flame, the more heat and LIGHT it releases."_

"AND YOU PROMISED HAWKEYE THAT YOU WOULDN'T DIE YOU BASTARD!"

Anything else Ed wanted to say was drowned out by the huge blinding explosion of white light that surrounded Mustang's body.

Shielding his eyes from the dazzling white flames Ed felt Pride's shadows retreat off of him and couldn't help but smile.

"_Shadows can't form in an area of pure white light." _

When the flames had died down a bit Ed opened his eyes to find Mustang standing a several feet in front of him. Even with the flames he looked like a mess, blood trickled down his body and pooled onto the ground beneath him. His uniform had defiantly seen better days and he looked exhausted. Ed quite frankly wouldn't be surprised if he just collapsed where he stood.

"You really know how to prove a point don't you Fullmetal?" came the slightly humored yet tired voice.

"Hey, like I said, Hawkeye would have my ass if you kicked the bucket on me. Not to mention all that paperwork." Ed replied sarcastically even though, inner self or not, he was still relieved that Mustang was OK enough to joke around.

"I have to say. I never even knew I could reach such temperatures." Ed heard the Colonel mumble to himself. "Let's see what it can do."

"Oi, wait a minute, you should rest for a bit." Ed started but Mustang had already taken off and most likely hadn't heard him.

Mustang raced towards Pride, his whole body ached and his mind told him that he'd already used enough energy, keeping the alchemy running for so long. Eventually, when he had no more energy to give, the array would lose its power and then he'd be in trouble.

"_I'll cross that bridge when I come to it,_" Mustang told himself. Besides, he was too far ahead to give up now and Roy was certain that he'd be able to defeat them before the little energy that he had ran dry. He would make sure of that.

He noticed shadows coming up from under his flight path but they bounced off as soon as they touched his white flames.

Satisfied, he slammed into Pride with all the momentum he had, sending both of them careening to the ground.

With one foot planted firmly onto Pride's stomach and a hand holding his head down, he raised his other arm knowing full well what he had to do.

"You bastard! Think you could just forget about me!"

Turning his head sharply he noticed Envy running towards him and was faintly amused that he had indeed forgotten about him.

"I'll deal with you later," Roy said. Raising his hand he sent a cyclone of fire straight towards Envy, big enough so that it couldn't be dodged by simply moving left or right.

It hit Envy straight on and Roy watched in grim satisfaction as Envy's vey skin was burned clean off his body.

He turned his attention back to Pride who was looking at him with pure hatred, wounds regenerating repeatedly within Mustang's grasp.

"You have too much pride to scream but let's change that shall we?" Mustang growled at him, before finally plunging his hand into his target and taking out the Philosopher's Stone within him.

Pride's body reacted violently when the Stone was taken out but even when the Stone was ripped out of him, even when his body turned to dust, he did not say a word, and his eyes portrayed no fear.

A pity really.

Getting up from his crouching position, Mustang found himself panting heavily, his eyes were losing focus and he rubbed them irritably.

"_Come on, just a bit more,"_ Mustang told himself, his brain forcing his body to remain functional. He had used up a huge chunk of his energy already by staying in his fire state for so long but he couldn't give in yet. _"Just one more to go. I can do this."_

"Mustang! Behind you!"

Roy whipped his head around just in time to a large green blur come into his vision. Acting on instinct he automatically raised his arms, palms facing forwards and released the biggest cyclone of fire that his strength could allow.

The force of the blast sent Roy skidding several feet backwards. His feet melting the snow on which he stood leaving two large barren streaks of earth under him.

Keeping the fire going was all that Roy was thinking about. He was panting heavily, his arms shaking at the strain and he was vaguely aware that he was losing too much blood for it to be remotely healthy. None the less, he concentrated every ounce of energy he had into keeping up his attack.

He heard Envy scream in pain and saw a dark figure in the middle of his white flames but that image was slowly blurring from his focus. It didn't matter what form Envy took, he wouldn't have been able to see it anyways. He was vaguely aware of his flames turning from a dazzling white to a deep orange before disappearing all together.

Before he knew it, he was lying on the snow, eyes clouded over, staring at nothing in particular. Half of his mind was screaming at him to finish Envy off but the other part of him was just telling him to sleep and he let his eyes close. Someone was shaking him, saying something, but the sounds seemed so far away that he ignored them.

And that was the last thing he remembered.

* * *

Ed saw the Colonel fall and was midway into running towards him before he realized that things weren't over yet.

Changing course he knew he only had a few seconds before Envy's body regenerated back. Without a moment's thought, clapped his hands and ran them along the ground, encasing the semi-formed body and the stone in its center in a solid block of ice. Granted, that wouldn't stop the stone but it did buy him a few valuable seconds in which the stone paused in order to factor the sudden change in temperature to the regeneration process.

It was close, but Ed just managed to use his automail blade to slice through the ice and the stone all together, granting a few more valuable seconds.

"_The second stage of alchemy is decomposition." _Ed told himself. Clapping his hands together as both fragments of the stone, along with the shattered ice, fell.

Quickly scooping up the fragments, he unleashed his alchemy in a burst of light and finally, when the light faded, Ed was holding onto nothing more than dust.

Ed stared at the dust for a while until if blew away in the wind, spiralling gracefully over his head for a while before disappearing further away.

With a relieved and exhausted sigh, Ed sank down to the ground. His heart was racing, still high on adrenaline and his mind didn't fully believe that it was finally over.

But then he remembered something, or rather some_one._

"Shit!" he yelled at no one in particular, leaping to his feet and racing over to where Mustang lay.

Flipping him over he was horrified to see that the gash Mustang had received from Envy was bleeding heavily. Combined with his bleeding shoulder from the two gun shots and the blood dripping down his face from when Pride had first attacked him and Mustang looked more like a pale zombie than a human.

"Oi! Wake up! Come on!" Ed shouted at Roy, shaking him hard.

When Mustang made no reply Ed groaned softly and massaged his temples.

"_He's losing too much blood, he's gonna die, he's gonna die, he's gonna fucking die and I can't do anything about it!"_

Ed was close to hyperventilating, terrified yet angry with himself at the thought that, yet again, he was useless when help was needed the most.

Ed closed his eyes and sat down, forcing himself not to think of anything except breathing.

When he opened his eyes again he realized that his mind was indeed clearer and he breathed a sigh of relief.

"_OK. That's right, calm down, Ed. Think. One step at time now." _he told himself.

"_We need to get the wounds to stop bleeding but how?" _Ed told himself. He had nothing with him now to generate a spark so it wasn't like he could try fire alchemy and burn them shut.

"_Ok, so no heat, what's the opposite of heat? Cold? I could freeze them shut. I've got plenty of snow to work with."_ Ed thought to himself, balancing on the balls of his feet in a crouched position.

"_Yeah, that should work. Next, I need to get him out of the cold so that I can go run and get some help. An igloo should do fine. Better get started. Hope I get back by nightfall."_

Practically leaping into action, Ed began packing snow into Mustang's wounds so he could activate the transmutation to close them up.

While he worked, some giddy part of Ed's brain couldn't help but think how much today had just plain old_ sucked.... _And it wasn't even over yet!

* * *

Damn, this was too short -_- Oh well, I think it turned out OK. Last chapter coming....tomorrow....or maybe the next day.....

If you like the story don't forget to review ^_^


	6. Chapter 6: Painful

_His mind was being torn in half, that was what it felt like. Part of him was being torn away from his own body, being replaced by someone else. _

_His mind had never been so clear before and yet his body was moving on its own._

_A woman was screaming and there was __**fire **__and, fuck! He was burning, she was burning....._

_Someone shot him, he didn't feel it but he saw blood everywhere._

_And there was still screaming, she was screaming and he was unable to do a __**thing**__._

_No, he __**was**__ doing something. And he realized with horror that __**he**__ was the one burning her. _

_And it wasn't just anyone. For when the flames died he was left standing over the mutilated body of his own Lieutenant._

"Riza!" Roy screamed out as he shot out of bed. He was breathing heavily, panicked eyes sweeping the room he was in. Something was beeping erratically; he made out people, dressed head to foot in white clothes surround him. The held him down with strong hands as he struggled weakly in his drugged up state.

"Don't touch me!" Roy yelled at them. Wriggling free of their grasp and subsequently falling right off the bed he was on, banging his head on the nearby dresser. He was vaguely aware that whatever was beeping was going even faster than when he had woken.

He was seeing stars and he felt a sharp pain in his arm as something was literally yanked out of him during his fall. He tried to sit back up but whatever pole he was holding onto went whizzing away from him when he tried to lean on it, sending Roy crashing back onto the floor, banging his head again.

Giving a pained yelp he clutched the back of his head before people grabbed him again. "Let go! Don't touch me!" Roy yelled at them, trying to wriggle free. However, they were too strong. Someone grabbed his hand, turning it so that his palm faced upwards, exposing the veins running through his arm. Someone else took out a sharp needle and reached forward to stick it into the vein.

At the sight of the needle, the beeping noise went haywire, but Roy didn't even hear it. "No!" Roy screamed at them, desperately trying to free himself from everyone's hold and only succeeding in banging his head on the dresser again for the third time.

Roy groaned in pain as one hand clutched the back of his head while the other wrestled with the people in white. Yet his struggling was futile and Roy watched with wide eyes as the needle went closer and closer to its target.

"Whoa, hold on for a second. Give the man some space," came a voice from above him. Instantly, a metal hand separated the deadly looking needle from Roy's arm and a few moments later he was released.

Unfortunately for him, the lack of support caused his body to flop back down to the floor and, Roy, being the cursed one that he is, instantly banged his head back onto the dresser again.

"Fuck!" Roy yelled out all too loudly. Clutching his poor head with both hands, Roy curled up at the foot of the dresser, making sure that he had repositioned himself so that his head was nowhere near the damn thing.

Someone was laughing and someone else was talking but he only really noticed when his head was lifted up and was being rubbed tenderly.

Opening his eyes he looked up right into the eyes of his Lieutenant who was smiling down warmly at him.

Roy blushed crimson but couldn't deny that the tender feeling on his poor head was making him feel better and stayed put. At least that was until he realized that his head was actually resting on the Lieutenant's lap. Whatever the beeping sound was went haywire again as Roy shot up into a sitting position. Whoever was laughing just laughed harder.

Turning his head towards the sound he was very surprised to see the rest of his crew, along with Havoc, in front of him. "Wait a minute, how'd you guys get here?" Roy asked, very confused. Wasn't he still in Briggs?

"Sir, you've been out of it for more than a week. We've had plenty of time to catch a car over here and we picked up Havoc along the way." Hawkeye responded.

"Don't make me sound like a stray cat!" Havoc defended himself.

Everyone laughed, even Roy grinned.

Turning his head a bit more he realized that Ed was talking to the people in white which he now recognized to be doctors.

"Sir, his heart monitor was going off, we had to drug him."

"Yeah but shouldn't you at least calm him down first? When we got in it sounded like he was about to have a heart attack."

There was a short silence then broken afterwards by another doctor who spoke up. "The drug would have calmed him down faster sir."

Ed sighed, "Fine, whatever, just go," he replied before turning over to the Colonel.

"It's about time you woke up you lazy ass. You know Winry and Al had to come up here too?"

"Honestly brother, I don't mind." Al spoke up and Roy finally noticed that Al was readjusting the IV rack which he had sent crashing to the floor during his frantic attempt at getting up.

Following the IV tube that connected him with it he noticed for the first time that he had bandages wrapped all around his torso. A metal clip was attached to his ring finger and Roy traced it towards a hear monitor that was sitting on top of the evil dresser. Along the way, he noticed an IV needle hanging over the bed that had most likely been the cause of the pain in his arm where he guessed the needle had been placed.

Turning back to Ed he raised an eyebrow.

"No one asked you to stay."

Ed looked away, rubbing the back of his head absent mindedly. "....Al was worried.....

"_So were you."_

"_Oh great, not you again."_

"_What's the matter? Miss me?"_

"_As if."_

Never mind the fact that when Ed had gotten back to the Colonel it was night time and the Mustang was practically frozen solid. Never mind that during surgery Ed had paced the hallways in guilt for not having been able to do anything to help during the fight and never mind that after surgery, the Colonel's heart had fucking **stopped** for a good minute and a half and Ed had literally snapped, pleading Al over the phone to come to Briggs so he wouldn't have to deal with this alone.

Did he care for the Colonel? Absolutely not.

"_Not even a little?"_

Nope, not even a little........

Ed sighed, he was totally in denial....but that was OK since only he and his inner self would ever know it.

"Oh, so the boy's finally woken up has he?" came a pleased voice, snapping Ed out from the conversation with.....himself.....

"_....I think I should see a therapist." _

"_But where's the fun in that?"_

"_You. Shudap."_

Roy's heart leaped at the new voice, causing the heart monitor to instantly go back to its beginning state of alarm.

"Fuhrer Grumman!" he said in surprise, trying to get to his feet but instantly felt a sharp pain in his chest and was pushed back down by Hawkeye.

"Oh, calm down general, can't a man come visit a subordinate after he's been in the hospital for almost two weeks? On top of that, Edward here refused to come in and I needed his report and I figured that I might as well give the news to you personally. So congratulations Mustang, you're going to be the new Fuhrer of Amestris in a month or two."

Roy blinked several times, his drugged up brain trying to make sense of all the information he had just received.

"WHAT?!" he yelled out after a short silence.

"You are the best candidate at the moment, Mustang, according to Fullmetal you took 3 homunculus down at once. No one will question your skills and your devotion to your country was proven months ago."

Roy simply sat on the ground, eyes wide, staring at everywhere but the Fuhrer. This all very hard to take in at once and his heart was agreeing with him since the beeping sound was rising dramatically.

Ed on the other hand was also floored, everyone else in Mustang's crew were smiling knowingly so why hadn't he known about this too?

"Wait, that Colonel Bastard is gonna be the next Fuhrer?!" Ed wondered.

The Fuhrer turned to him.

"Brigadier General Roy Mustang hasn't been a Colonel for quite some time Edward. I promoted him and Lieutenant General Armstrong for their work during the Promised Day several months ago." Grumman answered, a hint of confusion in his voice.

Ed stood there, mouth agape.

"_How many stars were there on his uniform? Just 3 right? I would have noticed if there were 4 right?"_

Ed slapped his forehead, grudgingly admitting that he never really checked because he was too....short...(there he said it) to see up to Mustang's shoulders anyways.

At least he knew now why Envy's disguise as Major Armstrong had been noticed. Getting ranks wrong 4 times in a row, including your own sister's rank, wasn't something a military man would do.

"_Yeah, like you should talk."_

"_I thought I told you to shut up!"_

If Mustang weren't so busy trying to come to the terms that **he **was the next Fuhrer he would have laughed at Ed's shocked expression.

As it was however, Mustang just sat there, oblivious to Ed's internal struggle as he tried desperately to sort out his own thoughts.

"Wait a minute," he asked, "Shouldn't Lieutenant General Armstrong be the next in line for the Fuhrer position?"

"I am perfectly happy here commanding Briggs, I have no wish to be Fuhrer of the whole nation," Armstrong replied, practically materializing out of nowhere behind the Fuhrer.

Having totally not expected such an appearance Mustang's heart went up a notch.

"Yes, and since after the Promised Day, there have been very little generals left and thus, you've been nominated Mustang. The rest of the brass approved unanimously," the Fuhrer continued. "I'm getting much too old for this and I plan on stepping down from my position within a month or two. Before then you should come back to Central, after you've finished healing of course, we have much to prepare you know. Don't forget the paperwork, speeches, you'll be making a lot of those and I'll inform you on the rest as soon as it stops sounding like you're about to have a heart attack."

Roy blushed in embarrassment. The whole time the Fuhrer had been telling Roy about his new responsibilities, Roy's heart rate was rising at every word, not to mention the embarrassment did nothing to stop the infuriating beeping.

"Oh yes and my advice for the Fuhrer's wife still stands," Grumman stated, turning around and beginning to head back out the door, the Lieutenant General following swiftly behind him.

Roy looked over at Hawkeye who did the same, their eyes met and there went Roy's poor heart again. Havoc laughed. Blushing and swiftly turning his head away, Roy tried to get up....only to instantly slam his head back on the top corner of the dresser.

Havoc just laughed harder but this time he was joined in by the rest of his crew, Roy swore he even heard the damn Fuhrer laugh and he looked up to a grinning Armstrong.

Deciding that his dignity had been smashed to pieces long ago, Roy just groaned and buried his head in his Lieutenant's lap.

So he was going to be the next Fuhrer. He couldn't wait really and the first thing he was going to do was to burn all heart monitors and evil dressers too because damn, the made life just so much more _painful._

* * *

So I like RoyXRiza. Sue me.

Kudos (no, I'm not really sure what the means either), to anyone who noticed that Riza says "General Mustang" in chapter 3.

And my first fan fic is finally complete! Thank you to all my reviewers who've seen it through till the end. If anyone is interested I've written a new story titled "No Matter What" so if you liked this one maybe you could give that a shot.

Sorry this chapter came out kind of late. Holidays are busy times. -_-


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